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rnoi 


Li  -i^ARY^ 

UKIV'r    S'.TY  OF 
CALIFORNIA 
SAN  DIE60  I 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  SAN  DIEGO 


3  1822  01600  3782 


Central  University  Library 

University  of  California,  San  Diego 
Note:  This  item  is  subject  to  recall  after  two  weeks. 

Date  Due 


.:.  11  \m 

0139(1/91) 


UCSD  Lib. 


LITERARY  TASTE 

HOW  TO  FORM  IT 


BY     ARNOLD     BENNETT 


Novels 

THE  OLD  WIVES'  TALE 

HELEN  W^ITH  THE  HIGH  HAND 

THE  BOOK  OF  CARLOTTA 

BURIED  ALIVE 

A  GREAT  MAN 

LEONORA 

WHOM  GOD  HATH  JOINED 

A  MAN  FROM  THE  NORTH 

ANNA  OF  THE  FIVE  TOWNS 

THE   GLIMPSE 

Pocket  Philosophies 

HOW    TO    LIVE    ON    24    HOURS   A 

DAY 
THE  HUMAN  MACHINE 
LITERARY   TASTE 
MENTAL  EFFICIENCY 

Miscellaneous 

CUPID  AND  COMMONSENSE:  A  Play 
^VHAT  THE  PUBLIC  WANTS:  A  Play 
THE  TRUTH  ABOUT  AN  AUTHOR 
THE  FEAST  OF  ST.  FRIEND 


GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK 


LITEKARY    TASTE 

HOW  TO  FORM  IT 


WITH  DETAILED  INSTRUCTIONS  FOR  COLLECTING 
A  COMPLETE  LIBRARY  OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE 


By 

ARNOLD   BENNETT 

Author  of   "The  Old  Wives'  Tale,"  "How  to  Live  on 
24  Hours  a  Day,"  "The  Human  Machine,"  etc 


GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS  NEW  YORK 


CONTENTS 


CHAP. 

1.   THE  AIM 


2.  YOUR  PARTICULAR   CASE 

3.  WHY  A   CLASSIC  IS  A   CLASSIC 

4.  WHERE   TO   BEGIN 

5.  HOW   TO  READ  A  CLASSIC 

6.  THE   QUESTION   OP    STYLE 

7.  WRESTLING   WITH    AN    AUTHOR 

8.  SYSTEM   IN   READING 

9.  VERSE  .... 

10.  BROAD  COUNSELS 

11.  AN   ENGLISH   LIBRARY:    PERIOD   L 

12.  AN   ENGLISH   LIBRARY:    PERIOD   H. 

13.  AN   ENGLISH   LIBRARY:    PERIOD   IH, 

14.  MENTAL   STOCKTAKING 


7 

14 
22 
29 
36 
44 
57 
64 
71 
84 
90 
97 
102 
113 


LITERARY  TASTE 

HOW  TO  FORM  IT 
CHAPTER  I 

THE    AIM 

At  the  beginning  a  misconception  must  be  re- 
moved from  the  path.  Many  people,  if  not 
most,  look  on  literary  taste  as  an  elegant  accom- 
plishment, by  acquiring  which  they  will  complete 
themselves,  and  make  themselves  finally  fit  as 
members  of  a  correct  society.  They  are  secretly 
ashamed  of  their  ignorance  of  literature,  in  the 
same  way  as  they  would  be  ashamed  of  their 
ignorance  of  etiquette  at  a  high  entertainment,  or 
of  their  inability  to  ride  a  horse  if  suddenly  called 
upon  to  do  so.  There  are  certain  things  that  a 
man  ought  to  know,  or  to  know  about,  and 
literature  is  one  of  them :  such  is  their  idea. 
They  have  learnt  to  dress  themselves  with  pro- 
priety, and  to  behave  with  propriety  on  all 
occasions ;  they  are  fairly  "  up  "  in  the  questions 
of  the  day ;  by  industry  and  enterprise  they  are 
succeeding  in  their  vocations ;  it  behoves  them, 
then,   not   to    forget   that    an    acquaintance   with 

7 


8  LITERARY  TASTE 

literature  is  an  indispensable  part  of  a  self-respect- 
ing man's  personal  baggage.  Painting  doesn't 
matter;  music  doesn't  matter  very  much.  But 
"  everyone  is  supposed  to  know  "  about  literature. 
Then,  literature  is  such  a  charming  distraction! 
Literary  taste  thus  serves  two  purposes:  as  a 
certificate  of  correct  culture  and  as  a  private 
pastime.  A  young  professor  of  mathematics,  im- 
mense at  mathematics  and  games,  dangerous  at 
chess,  capable  of  Haydn  on  the  violin,  once  said 
to  me,  after  listening  to  some  chat  on  books, 
"  Yes,  I  must  take  up  literature."  As  though 
saying :  "  I  was  rather  forgetting  literature. 
However,  I've  polished  off  all  these  other  things. 
I'll  have  a  shy  at  literature  now." 

This  attitude,  or  any  attitude  which  resembles 
it,  is  wrong.  To  him  who  really  comprehends 
what  literature  is,  and  what  the  function  of  litera- 
ture is,  this  attitude  is  simply  ludicrous.  It  is 
also  fatal  to  the  formation  of  literary  taste.  Peo- 
ple who  regard  literary  taste  simply  as  an  accom- 
plishment, and  literature  simply  as  a  distraction, 
will  never  truly  succeed  either  in  acquiring  the 
accomplishment  or  in  using  it  half-acquired  as  a 
distraction ;  though  the  one  is  the  most  perfect 
of  distractions,   and  though  the   other  is   unsur- 


THE  AIM  9 

passed  by  any  other  accomplishment  in  elegance 
or  in  power  to  impress  the  universal  snobbery  of 
civilised  mankind.  Literature,  instead  of  being 
an  accessory,  is  the  fundamental  sine  qua  non  of 
complete  living.  I  am  extremely  anxious  to  avoid 
rhetorical  exaggerations.  I  do  not  think  I  am 
guilty  of  one  in  asserting  that  he  who  has  not 
been  "  presented  to  the  freedom "  of  literature 
has  not  wakened  up  out  of  his  prenatal  sleep. 
He  is  merely  not  bom.  He  can't  see;  he  can't 
hear;  he  can't  feel,  in  any  full  sense.  He  can 
only  eat  his  dinner.  What  more  than  anything 
else  annoys  people  who  know  the  true  function 
of  literature,  and  have  profited  thereby,  is  the 
spectacle  of  so  many  thousands  of  individuals 
going  about  under  the  delusion  that  they  are  alive, 
when,  as  a  fact,  they  are  no  nearer  being  alive 
than  a  bear  in  winter. 

J« 
I  will  tell  you  what  literature  is !  No  —  I  only 
wish  I  could.  But  I  can't.  No  one  can.  Gleams 
can  be  thrown  on  the  secret,  inklings  given,  but 
no  more.  I  will  try  to  give  you  an  inkling. 
And,  to  do  so,  I  will  take  you  back  into  your  own 
history,  or  forward  into  it.  That  evening  when 
you  went  for  a  walk  with  your  faithful  friend,  the 
friend  from  whom  you  hid  nothing  —  or  almost 


10  LITERARY  TASTE 

nothing  .  .  .  !  You  were,  in  truth,  somewhat 
inchned  to  hide  from  him  the  particular  matter 
which  monopohsed  your  mind  that  evening,  but 
somehow  you  contrived  to  get  on  to  it,  drawn 
by  an  overpowering  fascination.  And  as  your 
faithful  friend  was  sympathetic  and  discreet,  and 
flattered  you  by  a  respectful  curiosity,  you  pro- 
ceeded further  and  further  into  the  said  matter, 
growing  more  and  more  confidential,  until  at  last 
you  cried  out,  in  a  terrific  whisper :  "  My  boy, 
she  is  simply  miraculous !  "  At  that  moment  you 
were  in  the  domain  of  literature. 

Let  me  explain.  Of  course,  in  the  ordinary 
acceptation  of  the  word,  she  was  not  miraculous. 
Your  faithful  friend  had  never  noticed  that  she 
was  miraculous,  nor  had  about  forty  thousand 
other  fairly  keen  observers.  She  was  just  a  girl. 
Troy  had  not  been  burnt  for  her.  A  girl  cannot 
be  called  a  miracle.  If  a  girl  is  to  be  called  a 
miracle,  then  you  might  call  pretty  nearly  any- 
thing a  miracle.  .  .  .  That  is  just  it:  you  might. 
You  can.  You  ought.  Amid  all  the  miracles  of 
the  universe  you  had  just  wakened  up  to  one. 
You  were  full  of  your  discovery.  You  were 
under  a  divine  impulsion  to  impart  that  discovery. 
You  had  a  strong  sense  of  the  marvellous  beauty 


THE  AIM  11 

of  something,  and  you  had  to  share  It.  You  were 
in  a  passion  about  something,  and  you  had  to  vent 
yourself  on  somebody.  You  were  drawn  towards 
the  whole  of  the  rest  of  the  human  race.  Mark  the 
effect  of  your  mood  and  utterance  on  your  faithful 
friend.  He  knew  that  she  was  not  a  miracle.  No 
other  person  could  have  made  him  believe  that  she 
was  a  miracle.  But  you,  by  the  force  and  sincerity 
of  your  own  vision  of  her,  and  by  the  fervour  of 
your  desire  to  make  him  participate  in  your  vision, 
did  for  quite  a  long  time  cause  him  to  feel  that  he 
had  been  blind  to  the  miracle  of  that  girl. 

!^ 

You  were  producing  literature.  You  were 
alive.  Your  eyes  were  unlidded,  your  ears  were 
unstopped,  to  some  part  of  the  beauty  and  the 
strangeness  of  the  world;  and  a  strong  instinct 
within  you  forced  you  to  tell  someone.  It  was 
not  enough  for  you  that  you  saw  and  heard. 
Others  had  to  see  and  hear.  Others  had  to  be 
wakened  up.  And  they  were !  It  is  quite  pos- 
sible —  I  am  not  quite  sure  —  that  your  faithful 
friend  the  very  next  day,  or  the  next  month,  looked 
at  some  other  girl,  and  suddenly  saw  that  she,  too, 
was  miraculous !     The  influence   of  literature ! 

.}« 

The  makers   of  literature   are  those  who  have 


12  LITERARY  TASTE 

seen  and  felt  the  miraculous  interestingness  of 
the  universe.  And  the  greatest  makers  of  litera- 
ture are  those  whose  vision  has  been  the  widest, 
and  whose  feeling  has  been  the  most  intense. 
Your  own  fragment  of  insight  was  accidental,  and 
perhaps  temporary.  Their  lives  are  one  long 
ecstasy  of  denying  that  the  world  is  a  dull  place. 
Is  it  nothing  to  you  to  learn  to  understand  that 
the  world  is  not  a  dull  place.?  Is  it  nothing  to 
you  to  be  led  out  of  the  tunnel  on  to  the  hillside, 
to  have  all  your  senses  quickened,  to  be  invigor- 
ated by  the  true  savour  of  life,  to  feel  your  heart 
beating  under  that  correct  necktie  of  yours? 
These  makers  of  literature  render  you  their  equals. 

The  aim  of  literary  study  is  not  to  amuse  the 
hours  of  leisure;  it  is  to  awake  oneself,  it  is  to  be 
alive,  to  intensify  one's  capacity  for  pleasure,  for 
sympathy,  and  for  comprehension.  It  is  not  to 
affect  one  hour,  but  twenty-four  hours.  It  is  to 
change  utterly  one's  relations  with  the  world.  An 
understanding  appreciation  of  literature  means  an 
understanding  appreciation  of  the  world,  and  it 
means  nothing  else.  Not  isolated  and  unconnected 
parts  of  life,  but  all  of  life,  brought  together  and 
correlated  in  a  synthetic  map !  The  spirit  of 
literature  is  unifying;  it  joins  the  candle  and  the 


THE  AIM  13 

star,  and  by  the  magic  of  an  image  shows  that  the 
beauty  of  the  greater  is  in  the  less.  And,  not 
content  with  the  disclosure  of  beauty  and  the 
bringing  together  of  all  things  whatever  within 
its  focus,  it  enforces  a  moral  wisdom  by  the  trac- 
ing everywhere  of  cause  and  effect.  It  consoles 
doubly  —  by  the  revelation  of  unsuspected  loveli- 
ness, and  by  the  proof  that  our  lot  is  the  common 
lot.  It  is  the  supreme  cry  of  the  discoverer, 
offering  sympathy  and  asking  for  it  in  a  single 
gesture.  In  attending  a  University  Extension 
Lecture  on  the  sources  of  Shakespeare's  plots,  or 
in  studying  the  researches  of  George  Saintsbury 
into  the  origins  of  English  prosody,  or  in  weigh- 
ing the  evidence  for  and  against  the  assertion  that 
Rousseau  was  a  scoundrel,  one  is  apt  to  forget 
what  literature  really  is  and  is  for.  It  is  well  to 
remind  ourselves  that  literature  is  first  and  last  a 
means  of  life,  and  that  the  enterprise  of  forming 
one's  literary  taste  is  an  enterprise  of  learning 
how  best  to  use  this  means  of  life.  People  who 
don't  want  to  live,  people  who  would  sooner 
hibernate  than  feel  intensely,  will  be  wise  to  eschew 
literature.  They  had  better,  to  quote  from  the 
finest  passage  in  a  fine  poem,  "  sit  around  and  eat 
blackberries."  The  sight  of  a  "  common  bush 
afire  with  God  "  might  upset  their  nerves. 


CHAPTER    II 

YOUR    PARTICULAR    CASE 

The  attitude  of  the  average  decent  person  towards 
the  classics  of  his  own  tongue  is  one  of  distrust  — 
I  had  almost  said,  of  fear.  I  will  not  take  the 
case  of  Shakespeare,  for  Shakespeare  is  "  taught " 
in  schools;  that  is  to  say,  the  Board  of  Education 
and  all  authorities  pedagogic  bind  themselves 
together  in  a  determined  effort  to  make  every  boy 
in  the  land  a  lifelong  enemy  of  Shakespeare.  (It 
is  a  mercy  they  don't  "teach"  Blake.)  I  will 
take,  for  an  example.  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  as  to 
whom  the  average  person  has  no  offensive  juvenile 
memories.  He  is  bound  to  have  read  somewhere 
that  the  style  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne  is  unsur- 
passed by  anything  in  English  literature.  One 
day  he  sees  the  Religio  Medici  in  a  shop-window 
(or,  rather,  outside  a  shop-window,  for  he  would 
hesitate  about  entering  a  bookshop),  and  he  buys 
it,  by  way  of  a  mild  experiment.  He  does  not 
expect  to  be  enchanted  by  it;  a  profound  instinct 
tells  him  that  Sir  Thomas  Browne  is  "  not  in  his 

14 


YOUR  PAllTICULxVll  CASE  15 

line  " ;  and  in  the  result  he  is  even  less  enchanted 
than  he  expected  to  be.  He  reads  the  introduc- 
tion, and  he  glances  at  the  first  page  or  two  of 
the  work.  He  sees  nothing  but  words.  The 
work  makes  no  appeal  to  him  whatever.  He  is 
surrounded  by  trees,  and  cannot  perceive  the 
forest.  He  puts  the  book  away.  If  Sir  Thomas 
Browne  is  mentioned,  he  will  say,  "  Yes,  very 
fine !  "  with  a  f eehng  of  pride  that  he  has  at  any 
rate  bought  and  inspected  Sir  Thomas  Browne. 
Deep  in  his  heart  is  a  suspicion  that  people  who 
get  enthusiastic  about  Sir  Thomas  Browne  are 
vain  and  conceited  poseurs.  After  a  year  or  so, 
when  he  has  recovered  from  the  discouragement 
caused  by  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  he  may,  if  he  is 
young  and  hopeful,  repeat  the  experiment  with 
Congreve  or  Addison.  Same  sequel !  And  so  on 
for  perhaps  a  decade,  until  his  commerce  with 
the  classics  finally  expires !  That,  magazines  and 
newish  fiction  apart,  is  the  literary  history  of  the 
average  decent  person. 

And  even  your  case,  though  you  are  genuinely 
preoccupied  with  thoughts  of  literature,  bears 
certain  disturbing  resemblances  to  the  drab  case 
of  the  average  person.  You  do  not  approach  the 
classics  with  gusto  —  anyhow,  not  with  the  same 


16  LITERARY  TASTE 

gusto  as  you  would  approach  a  new  novel  by  a 
modem  author  who  had  taken  your  fancy.  You 
never  murmured  to  yourself,  when  reading  Gib- 
bon's Decline  and  Fall  in  bed :  "  Well,  I  really 
must  read  one  more  chapter  before  I  go  to  sleep ! " 
Speaking  generally,  the  classics  do  not  afford  you 
a  pleasure  commensurate  with  their  renown.  You 
peruse  them  with  a  sense  of  duty,  a  sense  of 
doing  the  right  thing,  a  sense  of  "  Improving 
yourself,"  rather  than  with  a  sense  of  gladness. 
You  do  not  smack  your  lips ;  you  say :  "  That 
is  good  for  me."  You  make  little  plans  for  read- 
ing, and  then  you  invent  excuses  for  breaking 
the  plans.  Something  new,  something  which  is 
not  a  classic,  will  surely  draw  you  away  from  a 
classic.  It  is  all  very  well  for  you  to  pretend  to 
agree  with  the  verdict  of  the  elect  that  Clarissa 
Harlowe  is  one  of  the  greatest  novels  in  the  world 
—  a  new  Kipling,  or  even  a  new  number  of  a 
magazine,  will  cause  you  to  neglect  Clarissa 
Harlowe,  just  as  though  Kipling,  etc.,  could  not 
be  kept  for  a  few  days  without  turning  sour ! 
So  that  you  have  to  ordain  rules  for  yourself,  as: 
"  I  will  not  read  anything  else  until  I  have  read 
Richardson,  or  Gibbon,  for  an  hour  each  day." 
Thus  proving  that  you  regard  a  classic  as  a  pill, 
the   swallowing   of  which   merits   jam!     And   the 


YOUR  PARTICULAR  CASE  17 

more  modem  a  classic  Is,  the  more  it  resembles 
the  stuff  of  the  year  and  the  less  it  resembles  the 
classics  of  the  centuries,  the  more  easy  and 
enticing  do  you  find  that  classic.  Hence  you  are 
glad  that  George  Eliot,  the  Brontes,  Thackeray, 
are  considered  as  classics,  because  you  really  do 
enjoy  them.  Your  sentiments  concerning  them 
approach  your  sentiments  concerning  a  "  rattling 
good  story  "  in  a  magazine. 

I  may  have  exaggerated  —  or,  on  the  other 
hand,  I  may  have  understated  —  the  unsatisfactory 
characteristics  of  your  particular  case,  but  it  is 
probable  that  in  the  mirror  I  hold  up  you 
recognise  the  rough  outlines  of  your  likeness. 
You  do  not  care  to  admit  it;  but  it  is  so.  You 
are  not  content  with  yourself.  The  desire  to  be 
more  truly  literary  persists  in  you.  You  feel  that 
there  is  something  wrong  in  you,  but  you  cannot 
put  your  finger  on  the  spot.  Further,  you  feel 
that  you  are  a  bit  of  a  sham.  Something  within 
you  continually  forces  you  to  exhibit  for  the 
classics  an  enthusiasm  which  you  do  not  sincerely 
feel.  You  even  try  to  persuade  yourself  that  you 
are  enjoying  a  book,  when  the  next  moment  you 
drop  it  in  the  middle  and  forget  to  resume  it. 
You  occasionally  buy  classical  works,  and  do  not 


18  LITERARY  TASTE 

read  them  at  all;  you  practically  decide  that  It  Is 
enough  to  possess  them,  and  that  the  mere 
possession  of  them  gives  you  a  cachet.  The  truth 
Is,  you  are  a  sham.  And  your  soul  Is  a  sea  of 
uneasy  remorse.  You  reflect :  "  According  to 
what  Matthew  Arnold  says,  I  ought  to  be  per- 
fectly mad  about  Wordsworth's  Prelude.  And  I 
am  not.  Why  am  I  not?  Have  I  got  to  be 
learned,  to  undertake  a  vast  course  of  study,  in 
order  to  be  perfectly  mad  about  Wordsworth's 
Prelude?  Or  am  I  bom  without  the  faculty  of 
pure  taste  In  literature,  despite  my  vague  long- 
ings? I  do  wish  I  could  smack  my  lips  over 
Wordsworth's  Prelude  as  I  did  over  that  splendid 
story  by  H.  G.  Wells,  The  Country  of  the  Blind, 
In  the  Strand  Magazine!  "...  Yes,  I  am  con- 
vinced that  In  your  dissatisfied,  your  diviner 
moments,  you  address  yourself  In  these  terms.  I 
am  convinced  that  I  have  diagnosed  your  symp- 
toms. 

Now  the  enterprise  of  forming  one's  literary 
taste  Is  an  agreeable  one;  If  It  Is  not  agreeable 
it  cannot  succeed.  But  this  does  not  Imply  that 
It  Is  an  easy  or  a  brief  one.  The  enterprise  of 
beating  Colonel  Bogey  at  golf  is  an  agreeable  one, 
but  It  means  honest  and  regular  work,     A  fact  to 


YOUR  PARTICULAR  CASE  19 

be  borne  in  mind  always !  You  are  certainly  not 
going  to  realise  your  ambition  —  and  so  great,  so 
influential  an  ambition  !  —  by  spasmodic  and  half- 
hearted effort.  You  must  begin  by  making  up 
your  mind  adequately.  You  must  rise  to  the 
height  of  the  affair.  You  must  approach  a  grand 
undertaking  in  the  grand  manner.  You  ought 
to  mark  the  day  in  the  calendar  as  a  solemnity. 
Human  nature  is  weak,  and  has  need  of  tricky 
aids,  even  in  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  Time  will 
be  necessary  to  you,  and  time  regularly  and 
sacredly  set  apart.  Many  people  affirm  that  they 
cannot  be  regular,  that  regularity  numbs  them. 
I  think  this  is  true  of  a  very  few  people,  and 
that  in  the  rest  the  objection  to  regularity  is 
merely  an  attempt  to  excuse  idleness.  I  am 
inclined  to  think  that  you  personally  are  capable 
of  regularity.  And  I  am  sure  that  if  you  firmly 
and  constantly  devote  certain  specific  hours  on 
certain  specific  days  of  the  week  to  this  business 
of  forming  your  literary  taste,  you  will  arrive  at 
the  goal  much  sooner.  The  simple  act  of 
resolution  will  help  you.  This  is  the  first 
preliminary. 

at 

The  second  preliminary  is  to  surround  yourself 
with    books,    to    create    for    yourself    a    bookish 


20  LITERARY  TASTE 

atmosphere.  The  merely  physical  side  of  books 
is  important  —  more  important  than  it  may  seem 
to  the  inexperienced.  Theoretically  (save  for 
works  of  reference),  a  student  has  need  for  but 
one  book  at  a  time.  Theoretically,  an  amateur  of 
literature  might  develop  his  taste  by  expending 
sixpence  a  week,  or  a  penny  a  day,  in  one  six- 
penny edition  of  a  classic  after  another  sixpenny 
edition  of  a  classic,  and  he  might  store  his  library 
in  a  hat-box  or  a  biscuit-tin.  But  in  practice  he 
would  have  to  be  a  monster  of  resolution  to  suc- 
ceed in  such  conditions.  The  eye  must  be  flat- 
tered; the  hand  must  be  flattered;  the  sense  of 
owning  must  be  flattered.  Sacrifices  must  be 
made  for  the  acquisition  of  literature.  That 
which  has  cost  a  sacrifice  is  always  endeared.  A 
detailed  scheme  of  buying  books  will  come  later, 
in  the  light  of  further  knowledge.  For  the 
present,  buy  —  buy  whatever  has  received  the 
imprimatur  of  critical  authority.  Buy  without  any 
immediate  reference  to  what  you  will  read.  Buy! 
Surround  yourself  with  volumes,  as  handsome  as 
you  can  afford.  And  for  reading,  all  that  I  will 
now  particularly  enjoin  is  a  general  and  inclusive 
tasting,  in  order  to  attain  a  sort  of  familiarity 
with  the  look  of  "  literature  in  all  its  branches." 
A   turning   over    of   the   pages    of   a   volume    of 


YOUR  PARTICULAR  CASE  21 

Chambers's  Cyclopcedia  of  English  Literature,  the 
third  for  preference,  may  be  suggested  as  an 
admirable  and  a  diverting  exercise.  You  might 
mark  the  authors  that  flash  an  appeal  to  you. 


CHAPTER    III 

WHY   A    CLASSIC    IS   A    CLASSIC 

The  large  majority  of  our  fellow-citizens  care 
as  much  about  literature  as  they  care  about 
aeroplanes  or  the  programme  of  the  Legislature. 
They  do  not  ignore  it;  they  are  not  quite  in- 
different to  it.  But  their  interest  in  it  is  faint 
and  perfunctory;  or,  if  their  interest  happens 
to  be  violent,  it  is  spasmodic.  Ask  the  two 
hundred  thousand  persons  whose  enthusiasm  made 
the  vogue  of  a  popular  novel  ten  years  ago  what 
they  think  of  that  novel  now,  and  you  will  gather 
that  they  have  utterly  forgotten  it,  and  that  they 
would  no  more  dream  of  reading  it  again  than 
of  reading  Bishop  Stubbs's  Select  Charters. 
Probably  if  they  did  read  it  again  they  would 
not  enjoy  it  —  not  because  the  said  novel  is  a 
whit  worse  now  than  it  was  ten  years  ago;  not 
because  their  taste  has  improved  —  but  because 
they  have  not  had  sufficient  practice  to  be  able 
to  rely  on  their  taste  as  a  means  of  permanent 


WHY  A  CLASSIC  IS  A  CLASSIC       23 

pleasure.     They  simply  don't  know  from  one  day 
to  the  next  what  will  please  them. 

In  the  face  of  this  one  may  ask:  Why  does 
the  great  and  universal  fame  of  classical  authors 
continue?  The  answer  is  that  the  fame  of 
classical  authors  is  entirely  independent  of  the 
majority.  Do  you  suppose  that  if  the  fame  of 
Shakespeare  depended  on  the  man  in  the  street 
it  would  survive  a  fortnight?  The  fame  of 
classical  authors  is  originally  made,  and  it  is 
maintained,  by  a  passionate  few.  Even  when  a 
first-class  author  has  enjoyed  immense  success 
during  his  lifetime,  the  majority  have  never  appre- 
ciated him  so  sincerely  as  they  have  appreciated 
second-rate  men.  He  has  always  been  reinforced 
by  the  ardour  of  the  passionate  few.  And  in  the 
case  of  an  author  who  has  emerged  into  glory 
after  his  death  the  happy  sequel  has  been  due 
solely  to  the  obstinate  perseverance  of  the  few. 
They  could  not  leave  him  alone;  they  would  not. 
They  kept  on  savouring  him,  and  talking  about 
him,  and  buying  him,  and  they  generally  behaved 
with  such  eager  zeal,  and  they  were  so  authorita- 
tive and  sure  of  themselves,  that  at  last  the  major- 
ity grew  accustomed  to  the  sound  of  his  name 
and  placidly  agreed  to  the  proposition  that  he  was 


24  LITERARY  TASTE 

a  genius;  the  majority  really  did  not  care  very 
much  either  way. 

And  it  is  by  the  passionate  few  that  the  renown 
of  genius  is  kept  alive  from  one  generation  to 
another.  These  few  are  always  at  work.  They 
are  always  rediscovering  genius.  Their  curiosity 
and  enthusiasm  are  exhaustless,  so  that  there  is 
little  chance  of  genius  being  ignored.  And, 
moreover,  they  are  always  working  either  for  or 
against  the  verdicts  of  the  majority.  The  ma- 
jority can  make  a  reputation,  but  it  is  too  careless 
to  maintain  it.  If,  by  accident,  the  passionate 
few  agree  with  the  majority  in  a  particular 
instance,  they  will  frequently  remind  the  majority 
that  such  and  such  a  reputation  has  been  made, 
and  the  majority  will  idly  concur:  "Ah,  yes.  By 
the  way,  we  must  not  forget  that  such  and  such 
a  reputation  exists."  Without  that  persistent 
memory-jogging  the  reputation  would  quickly  fall 
into  the  oblivion  which  is  death.  The  passionate 
few  only  have  their  way  by  reason  of  the  fact 
that  they  are  genuinely  interested  in  literature, 
that  literature  matters  to  them.  They  conquer 
by  their  obstinacy  alone,  by  their  eternal  repe- 
tition of  the  same  statements.  Do  you  suppose 
they   could  prove  to  the  man   in   the  street  that 


.WHY  A  CLASSIC  IS  A  CLASSIC       25 

Shakespeare  was  a  great  artist?  The  said  man 
would  not  even  understand  the  terms  they  em- 
ployed. But  when  he  is  told  ten  thousand  times, 
and  generation  after  generation,  that  Shakespeare 
was  a  great  artist,  the  said  man  believes  —  not 
by  reason,  but  by  faith.  And  he  too  repeats  that 
Shakespeare  was  a  great  artist,  and  he  buys  the 
complete  works  of  Shakespeare  and  puts  them 
on  his  shelves,  and  he  goes  to  see  the  marvellous 
stage-effects  which  accompany  King  Lear  or 
Hamlet,  and  comes  back  religiously  convinced 
that  Shakespeare  was  a  great  artist.  All  because 
the  passionate  few  could  not  keep  their  admiration 
of  Shakespeare  to  themselves.  This  is  not  cyni- 
cism; but  truth.  And  it  is  important  that  those 
who  wish  to  form  their  literary  taste  should 
grasp  it. 

at 

What  causes  the  passionate  few  to  make  such 
a  fuss  about  literature?  There  can  be  only  one 
reply.  They  find  a  keen  and  lasting  pleasure  in 
literature.  They  enjoy  literature  as  some  men 
enjoy  beer.  The  recurrence  of  this  pleasure 
naturally  keeps  their  interest  in  literature  very 
much  alive.  They  are  for  ever  making  new 
researches,  for  ever  practising  on  themselves. 
They  learn  to  understand  themselves.     They  learn 


26  LITERARY  TASTE 

to  know  what  they  want.  Their  taste  becomes 
surer  and  surer  as  their  experience  lengthens. 
They  do  not  enjoy  to-day  what  will  seem  tedious 
to  them  to-morrow.  When  they  find  a  book 
tedious,  no  amount  of  popular  clatter  will  per- 
suade them  that  it  is  pleasurable ;  and  when  they 
find  it  pleasurable  no  chill  silence  of  the  street- 
crowds  will  affect  their  conviction  that  the  book 
is  good  and  permanent.  They  have  faith  in 
themselves.  What  are  the  qualities  in  a  book 
which  give  keen  and  lasting  pleasure  to  the  pas- 
sionate few?  This  is  a  question  so  difficult  that 
it  has  never  yet  been  completely  answered.  You 
may  talk  lightly  about  truth,  insight,  knowledge, 
wisdom,  humour,  and  beauty.  But  these  com- 
fortable words  do  not  really  carry  you  very  far, 
for  each  of  them  has  to  be  defined,  especially  the 
first  and  last.  It  is  all  very  well  for  Keats  in  his 
airy  manner  to  assert  that  beauty  is  truth,  truth 
beauty,  and  that  that  is  all  he  knows  or  needs  to 
know.  I,  for  one,  need  to  know  a  lot  more.  And 
I  never  shall  know.  Nobody,  not  even  Hazlitt  nor 
Sainte-Beuve,  has  ever  finally  explained  why  he 
thought  a  book  beautiful.  I  take  the  first  fine 
lines  that  come  to  hand  — 

The  woods  of  Arcady  are  dead, 
And  over  is  their  antique  joy — 


WHY  A  CLASSIC  IS  A  CLASSIC       27 

and  I  say  that  those  lines  are  beautiful  because 
they  give  me  pleasure.  But  why?  No  answer! 
I  only  know  that  the  passionate  few  will,  broadly, 
agree  with  me  in  deriving  this  mysterious  pleasure 
from  those  lines.  I  am  only  convinced  that  the 
liveliness  of  our  pleasure  in  those  and  many  other 
lines  by  the  same  author  will  ultimately  cause  the 
majority  to  believe,  by  faith,  that  W.  B.  Yeats 
is  a  genius.  The  one  reassuring  aspect  of  the 
literary  affair  is  that  the  passionate  few  are  pas- 
sionate about  the  same  things.  A  continuance 
of  interest  does,  in  actual  practice,  lead  ultimately 
to  the  same  judgments.  There  is  only  the  dif- 
ference in  width  of  interest.  Some  of  the  pas- 
sionate few  lack  catholicity,  or,  rather,  the  whole 
of  their  interest  is  confined  to  one  narrow  channel ; 
they  have  none  left  over.  These  men  help  specially 
to  vitalise  the  reputations  of  the  narrower  gen- 
iuses :  such  as  Crashaw.  But  their  active  predi- 
lections never  contradict  the  general  verdict  of  the 
passionate  few;  rather  they   reinforce  it. 

it 
A  classic  Is  a  work  which  gives  pleasure  to  the 
minority  which  is  intensely  and  permanently  inter- 
ested in  literature.  It  lives  on  because  the 
minority,  eager  to  renew  the  sensation  of  pleasure, 
is   eternally   curious   and  is   therefore   engaged   in 


28  LITERARY  TASTE 

an  eternal  process  of  rediscovery.  A  classic  does 
not  survive  for  any  ethical  reason.  It  does  not 
survive  because  it  conforms  to  certain  canons,  or 
because  neglect  would  not  kill  it.  It  survives  be- 
cause it  is  a  source  of  pleasure,  and  because  the 
passionate  few  can  no  more  neglect  it  than  a  bee 
can  neglect  a  flower.  The  passionate  few  do  not 
read  "  the  right  things  "  because  they  are  right. 
That  is  to  put  the  cart  before  the  horse.  "  The 
right  things  "  are  the  right  things  solely  because 
the  passionate  few  like  reading  them.  Hence  — 
and  I  now  arrive  at  my  point  —  the  one  primary 
essential  to  literary  taste  is  a  hot  interest  in  litera- 
ture. If  you  have  that,  all  the  rest  will  come. 
It  matters  nothing  that  at  present  you  fail  to  find 
pleasure  in  certain  classics.  The  driving  impulse 
of  your  interest  will  force  you  to  acquire  experi- 
ence, and  experience  will  teach  you  the  use  of  the 
means  of  pleasure.  You  do  not  know  the  secret 
ways  of  yourself:  that  is  all.  A  continuance  of 
interest  must  inevitably  bring  you  to  the  keenest 
joys.  But,  of  course,  experience  may  be  acquired 
judiciously  or  injudiciously,  just  as  Putney  may 
be  reached  via  Walham  Green  or  via  St.  Peters- 
burg. 


CHAPTER   IV 


WHEEE   TO    BEGIN 


I  WISH  particularly  that  my  readers  should  not  be 
intimidated  by  the  apparent  vastness  and  com- 
plexity of  this  enterprise  of  forming  the  literary 
taste.  It  is  not  so  vast  nor  so  complex  as  it  looks. 
There  is  no  need  whatever  for  the  inexperienced 
enthusiast  to  confuse  and  frighten  himself  with 
thoughts  of  "  literature  in  all  its  branches."  Ex- 
perts and  pedagogues  (chiefly  pedagogues)  have, 
for  the  purpose  of  convenience,  split  literature  up 
into  divisions  and  sub-divisions  —  such  as  prose 
and  poetry  ;  or  imaginative,  philosophic,  historical ; 
or  elegiac,  heroic,  lyric;  or  religious  and  profane, 
etc.,  ad  infinitum.  But  the  greater  truth  is  that 
literature  is  all  one  —  and  indivisible.  The  idea 
of  the  unity  of  literature  should  be  well  planted 
and  fostered  in  the  head.  All  literature  is  the 
expression  of  feeling,  of  passion,  of  emotion, 
caused  by  a  sensation  of  the  interestingness  of 
life.  What  drives  a  historian  to  write  history? 
Nothing  but  the  overwhelming  impression  made 
^9 


30  LITERARY  TASTE 

upon  him  by  the  survey  of  past  times.  He  is 
forced  into  an  attempt  to  reconstitute  the  picture 
for  others.  If  hitherto  you  have  failed  to  per- 
ceive that  a  historian  is  a  being  in  strong  emotion, 
trying  to  convey  his  emotion  to  others,  read  the 
passage  in  the  Memoirs  of  Gibbon,  in  which  he 
describes  how  he  finished  the  Decline  and  Fall. 
You  will  probably  never  again  look  upon  the 
Decline  and  Fall  as  a  "  dry  "  work. 

What  applies  to  history  applies  to  the  other 
"  dry  "  branches.  Even  Johnson's  Dictionary  is 
packed  with  emotion.  Read  the  last  paragraph 
of  the  preface  to  it:  "  In  this  work,  when  it  shall 
be  found  that  much  is  omitted,  let  it  not  be  for- 
gotten that  much  likewise  is  performed.  ...  It 
may  repress  the  triumph  of  malignant  criticism  to 
observe  that  if  our  language  is  not  here  fully  dis- 
played, I  have  only  failed  in  an  attempt  which  no 
human  powers  have  hitherto  completed.  .  .  ." 
And  so  on  to  the  close :  "  I  have  protracted  my 
work  till  most  of  those  whom  I  wish  to  please  have 
sunk  into  the  grave,  and  success  and  miscarriage 
are  empty  sounds :  I  therefore  dismiss  it  with  frigid 
tranquillity,  having  little  to  fear  or  hope  from 
censure  or  from  praise."  Yes,  tranquillity;  but 
not  frigid !     The  whole  passage,  one  of  the  finest 


WHERE  TO  BEGIN  31 

in  English  prose,  is  marked  by  the  heat  of  emotion. 
You  may  discover  the  same  quality  in  such  books 
as  Spencer's  First  Principles.  You  may  discover 
it  everywhere  in  literature,  from  the  cold  fire  of 
Pope's  irony  to  the  blasting  temperatures  of  Swin- 
burne. Literature  does  not  begin  till  emotion  has 
begun. 

There  is  even  no  essential,  definable  difference 
between  those  two  great  branches,  prose  and 
poetry.  For  prose  may  have  rhythm.  All  that 
can  be  said  is  that  verse  will  scan,  while  prose  will 
not.  The  difference  is  purely  formal.  Very  few 
poets  have  succeeded  in  being  so  poetical  as  Isaiah, 
Sir  Thomas  Browne,  and  Ruskin  have  been  in 
prose.  It  can  only  be  stated  that,  as  a  rule,  writers 
have  shown  an  instinctive  tendency  to  choose  verse 
for  the  expression  of  the  very  highest  emotion. 
The  supreme  literature  is  in  verse,  but  the  finest 
achievements  in  prose  approach  so  nearly  to  the 
finest  achievements  in  verse  that  it  is  ill  work  decid- 
ing between  them.  In  the  sense  in  which  poetry 
is  best  understood,  all  literature  is  poetry  —  or 
is,  at  any  rate,  poetical  in  quality.  Macaulay's  ill- 
informed  and  unjust  denunciations  live  because  his 
genuine  emotion  made  them  into  poetry,  while  his 
Lai/s  of  Ancient  Rome  are  dead  because  they  are 


32  LITERARY  TASTE 

not  the  expression  of  a  genuine  emotion.  As  the 
literary  taste  develops,  this  quality  of  emotion, 
restrained  or  loosed,  will  be  more  and  more  widely 
perceived  at  large  in  literature.  It  is  the  quality 
that  must  be  looked  for.  It  is  the  quality  that 
unifies  literature  (and  all  the  arts). 

It  is  not  merely  useless,  it  is  harmful,  for  you 
to  map  out  literature  into  divisions  and  branches, 
with  different  laws,  rules,  or  canons.  The  first 
thing  is  to  obtain  some  possession  of  literature. 
When  you  have  actually  felt  some  of  the  emotion 
which  great  writers  have  striven  to  impart  to  you, 
and  when  your  emotions  become  so  numerous  and 
puzzling  that  you  feel  the  need  of  arranging  them 
and  calling  them  by  names,  then  —  and  not  before 
—  you  can  begin  to  study  what  has  been  attempted 
in  the  way  of  classifying  and  ticketing  literature. 
Manuals  and  treatises  are  excellent  things  in  their 
kind,  but  they  are  simply  dead  weight  at  the  start. 
You  can  only  acquire  really  useful  general  ideas 
by  first  acquiring  particular  ideas,  and  putting 
those  particular  ideas  together.  You  cannot  make 
bricks  without  straw.  Do  not  worry  about  litera- 
ture in  the  abstract,  about  theories  as  to  literature. 
Get  at  it.  Get  hold  of  literature  in  the  concrete 
as  a  dog  gets  hold  of  a  bone.     If  you  ask  me  where 


WHERE  TO  BEGIN  33 

you  ought  to  begin,  I  shall  gaze  at  you  as  I  might 
gaze  at  the  faithful  animal  if  he  inquired  which 
end  of  the  bone  he  ought  to  attack.  It  doesn't 
matter  in  the  slightest  degree  where  you  begin. 
Begin  wherever  the  fancy  takes  you  to  begin. 
Literature  is  a  whole. 

There  is  only  one  restriction  for  you.  You 
must  begin  with  an  acknowledged  classic ;  you  must 
eschew  modem  works.  The  reason  for  this  does 
not  imply  any  depreciation  of  the  present  age  at 
the  expense  of  past  ages.  Indeed,  it  is  important, 
if  you  wish  ultimately  to  have  a  wide,  catholic 
taste,  to  guard  against  the  too  common  assumption 
that  nothing  modern  will  stand  comparison  with 
the  classics.  In  every  age  there  have  been  people 
to  sigh :  "  Ah,  yes.  Fifty  years  ago  we  had  a 
few  great  writers.  But  they  are  all  dead,  and  no 
young  ones  are  arising  to  take  their  place."  This 
attitude  of  mind  is  deplorable,  if  not  silly,  and  is 
a  certain  proof  of  narrow  taste.  It  is  a  surety 
that  in  1959  gloomy  and  egregious  persons  will 
be  saying :  "  Ah,  yes.  At  the  beginning  of  the 
century  there  were  great  poets  like  Swinburne, 
Meredith,  Francis  Thompson,  and  Yeats.  Great 
novelists  like  Hardy  and  Conrad.  Great  historians 
like  Stubbs  and  ]\Iaitland,  etc.,  etc.     But  they  are 


34  LITERARY  TASTE 

all  dead  now,  and  whom  have  we  to  take  their 
place?"  It  is  not  until  an  age  has  receded  into 
history,  and  all  its  mediocrity  has  dropped  away 
from  it,  that  we  can  see  it  as  it  is  —  as  a  group  of 
men  of  genius.  We  forget  the  immense  amount 
of  twaddle  that  the  great  epochs  produced.  The 
total  amount  of  fine  literature  created  in  a  given 
period  of  time  differs  from  epoch  to  epoch,  but  it 
does  not  differ  much.  And  we  may  be  perfectly 
sure  that  our  own  age  will  make  a  favourable 
impression  upon  that  excellent  judge,  posterity. 
Therefore,  beware  of  disparaging  the  present  in 
your  own  mind.  While  temporarily  ignoring  it, 
dwell  upon  the  idea  that  its  chaff  contains  about 
as  much  wheat  as  any  similar  quantity  of  chaff  has 
contained  wheat. 

at 

The  reason  why  you  must  avoid  modern  works 
at  the  beginning  is  simply  that  you  are  not  in  a 
position  to  choose  among  modem  works.  No- 
body at  all  is  quite  in  a  position  to  choose  with 
certainty  among  modem  works.  To  sift  the  wheat 
from  the  chaff  is  a  process  that  takes  an  exceed- 
ingly long  time.  Modem  works  have  to  pass 
before  the  bar  of  the  taste  of  successive  genera- 
tions. Whereas,  with  classics,  which  have  been 
through  the  ordeal,  almost  the  reverse  is  the  case. 


WHERE  TO  BEGIN  36 

Your  taste  has  to  pass  before  the  bar  of  the  classics. 
That  is  the  point.  If  you  differ  with  a  classic, 
it  is  you  who  are  wrong,  and  not  the  book.  If 
you  differ  with  a  modem  work,  you  may  be  wrong 
or  you  may  be  right,  but  no  judge  is  authoritative 
enough  to  decide.  Your  taste  is  unformed.  It 
needs  guidance,  and  it  needs  authoritative  guidance. 
Into  the  business  of  forming  Hterary  taste  faith 
enters.  You  probably  will  not  specially  care  for 
a  particular  classic  at  first.  If  you  did  care  for 
it  at  first,  your  taste,  so  far  as  that  classic  is  con- 
cerned, would  be  formed,  and  our  hypothesis  is 
that  your  taste  is  not  formed.  How  are  you  to 
arrive  at  the  stage  of  caring  for  it.?  Chiefly,  of 
course,  by  examining  it  and  honestly  trying  to 
understand  it.  But  this  process  is  materially 
helped  by  an  act  of  faith,  by  the  frame  of  mind 
which  says :  "  I  know  on  the  highest  authority  that 
this  thing  is  fine,  that  it  is  capable  of  giving  me 
pleasure.  Hence  I  am  determined  to  find  pleasure 
in  it."  Believe  me  that  faith  counts  enormously 
in  the  development  of  that  wide  taste  which  is  the 
instrument  of  wide  pleasures.  But  it  must  be 
faith  founded  on  unassailable  authority. 


CHAPTER   V 

HOW  TO   READ   A   CLASSIC 

Let  us  begin  experimental  reading  with  Charles 
Lamb.  I  choose  Lamb  for  various  reasons:  He 
is  a  great  writer,  wide  in  his  appeal,  of  a  highly 
sympathetic  temperament ;  and  his  finest  achieve- 
ments are  simple  and  very  short.  Moreover,  he 
may  usefully  lead  to  other  and  more  complex 
matters,  as  will  appear  later.  Now,  your  natural 
tendency  will  be  to  think  of  Charles  Lamb  as  a 
book,  because  he  has  arrived  at  the  stage  of  being 
a  classic.  Charles  Lamb  was  a  man,  not  a  book. 
It  is  extremely  important  that  the  beginner  in 
literary  study  should  always  form  an  idea  of  the 
man  behind  the  book.  The  book  is  nothing  but 
the  expression  of  the  man.  The  book  is  nothing 
but  the  man  trying  to  talk  to  you,  trying  to  im- 
part to  you  some  of  his  feelings.  An  experienced 
student  will  divine  the  man  from  the  book,  will 
understand  the  man  by  the  book,  as  is,  of  course, 
logically  proper.     But  the  beginner  will  do  well 

36 


HOW  TO  READ  A  CLASSIC  37 

to  aid  himself  in  understanding  the  book  by  means 
of  independent  information  about  the  man.  He 
will  thus  at  once  relate  the  book  to  something 
human,  and  strengthen  in  his  mind  the  essential 
notion  of  the  connection  between  literature  and 
life.  The  earliest  literature  was  delivered  orally 
direct  by  the  artist  to  the  recipient.  In  some 
respects  this  arrangement  was  ideal.  Changes  in 
the  constitution  of  society  have  rendered  it  im- 
possible. Nevertheless,  we  can  still,  by  the  exer- 
cise of  the  imagination,  hear  mentally  the  accents 
of  the  artist  speaking  to  us.  We  must  so  exercise 
our  imagination  as  to  feel  the  man  behind  the  book. 

at 

Some  biographical  information  about  Lamb 
should  be  acquired.  There  are  excellent  short 
biographies  of  him  by  Canon  Ainger  in  the 
Dictionary  of  National  Biography,  in  Chambers's 
Encyclopcedia,  and  in  Chambers's  Cyclopcedia  of 
^English  Literature.  If  you  have  none  of  these 
(but  you  ought  to  have  the  last),  there  are  Mr. 
E.  V.  Lucas's  exhaustive  Life,  and  Mr.  Walter 
Jerrold's  Lamb;  also  introductory  studies  prefixed 
to  various  editions  of  Lamb's  works.  Indeed,  the 
facilities  for  collecting  materials  for  a  picture 
of  Charles  Lamb  as  a  human  being  are  pro- 
digious.    When  you  have  made  for  yourself  such 


38  LITERARY  TASTE 

a  picture,  read  the  Essays  of  Elia  by  the  light  of 
it.  I  will  choose  one  of  the  most  celebrated, 
Dream  Children:  A  Reverie.  At  this  point, 
kindly  put  my  book  down,  and  read  Dream  Chil- 
dren. Do  not  say  to  yourself  that  you  will  read 
it  later,  but  read  it  now.  When  you  have  read  it, 
you  may  proceed  to  my  next  paragraph. 

You  are  to  consider  Dream  Children  as  a  human 
document.  Lamb  was  nearing  fifty  when  he  wrote 
it.  You  can  see,  especially  from  the  last  line, 
that  the  death  of  his  elder  brother,  John  Lamb, 
was  fresh  and  heavy  on  his  mind.  You  will  rec- 
ollect that  in  youth  he  had  had  a  disappointing 
love-affair  with  a  girl  named  Ann  Simmons,  who 
afterwards  married  a  man  named  Bartrum.  You 
will  know  that  one  of  the  influences  of  his  child- 
hood was  his  grandmother  Field,  housekeeper  of 
Blakesware  House,  in  Hertfordshire,  at  which  man- 
sion he  sometimes  spent  his  holidays.  You  will 
know  that  he  was  a  bachelor,  living  with  his  sister 
Mary,  who  was  subject  to  homicidal  mania.  And 
you  will  see  in  this  essay,  primarily,  a  supreme 
expression  of  the  increasing  loneliness  of  his  life. 
He  constructed  all  that  preliminary  tableau  of 
paternal  pleasure  in  order  to  bring  home  to  you 
in  the  most  poignant  way  his  feeling  of  the  soli- 


HOW  TO  READ  A  CLASSIC  39 

tude  of  his  existence,  his  sense  of  all  that  he  had 
missed  and  lost  in  the  world.  The  key  of  the 
essay  is  one  of  profound  sadness.  But  note  that 
he  makes  his  sadness  beautiful ;  or,  rather,  he  shows 
the  beauty  that  resides  in  sadness.  You  watch 
him  sitting  there  in  his  "  bachelor  arm-chair,"  and 
you  say  to  yourself:  "  Yes,  it  was  sad,  but  it  was 
somehow  beautiful."  When  you  have  said  that  to 
yourself,  Charles  Lamb,  so  far  as  you  are  con- 
cerned, has  accomplished  his  chief  aim  in  writing 
the  essay.  How  exactly  he  produces  his  effect  can 
never  be  fully  explained.  But  one  reason  of  his 
success  is  certainly  his  regard  for  truth.  He  does 
not  falsely  idealise  his  brother,  nor  the  relations 
between  them.  He  does  not  say,  as  a  sentimental- 
ist would  have  said,  "  Not  the  slightest  cloud  ever 
darkened  our  relations  " ;  nor  does  he  exaggerate 
his  solitude.  Being  a  sane  man,  he  has  too  much 
common-sense  to  assemble  all  his  woes  at  once. 
He  might  have  told  you  that  Bridget  was  a  homi- 
cidal maniac;  what  he  does  tell  you  is  that  she  was 
faithful.  Another  reason  of  his  success  is  his  con- 
tinual regard  for  beautiful  things  and  fine  actions, 
as  illustrated  in  the  major  characteristics  of  his 
grandmother  and  his  brother,  and  in  the  detailed 
description  of  Blakesware  House  and  the  gardens 
thereof. 


40  LITERARY  TASTE 

j« 

Then,  subordinate  to  the  main  purpose,  part  of 
the  machinery  of  the  main  purpose,  is  the  picture 
of  the  children  —  real  children  until  the  moment 
when  they  fade  away.  The  traits  of  childhood 
are  accurately  and  humorously  put  in  again  and 
again :  "  Here  John  smiled,  as  much  as  to  say, 
*  That  would  be  foolish  indeed.'  "  "  Here  little 
Alice  spread  her  hands."  "  Here  Alice's  little 
right  foot  played  an  involuntary  movement,  till, 
upon  my  looking  grave,  it  desisted."  "  Here 
John  expanded  all  his  eyebrows,  and  tried  to  look 
courageous."  "  Here  John  slily  deposited  back 
upon  the  plate  a  bunch  of  grapes."  "  Here  the 
children  fell  a-crying  .  .  .  and  prayed  me  to  tell 
them  some  stories  about  their  pretty  dead  mother.*' 
And  the  exquisite :  "  Here  Alice  put  out  one  of 
her  dear  mother's  looks,  too  tender  to  be  upbraid- 
ing." Incidentallj^,  while  preparing  his  ultimate 
solemn  effect,  Lamb  has  inspired  you  with  a  new, 
intensified  vision  of  the  wistful  beauty  of  children 
—  their  imitativeness,  their  facile  and  generous 
emotions,  their  anxiety  to  be  correct,  their  ingenu- 
ous haste  to  escape  from  grief  into  joy.  You 
can  see  these  children  almost  as  clearly  and  as 
tenderly  as  Lamb  saw  them.  For  days  afterwards 
you  will  not  be  able  to  look  upon  a  child  without 


HOW  TO  READ  A  CLASSIC  41 

recalling  Lamb's  portrayal  of  the  grace  of  child- 
Iiood.  He  will  have  shared  with  you  his  percep- 
tion of  beauty.  If  you  possess  children,  he  will 
have  renewed  for  you  the  charm  which  custom  does 
very  decidedly  stale.  It  is  further  to  be  noticed 
that  the  measure  of  his  success  in  picturing  the 
children  is  the  measure  of  his  success  in  his  main 
effect.  The  more  real  they  seem,  the  more  touch- 
ing is  the  revelation  of  the  fact  that  they  do  not 
exist,  and  never  have  existed.  And  if  you  were 
moved  by  the  reference  to  their  "  pretty  dead 
mother,"  you  will  be  still  more  moved  when  you 
leara  that  the  girl  who  would  have  been  their 
mother  is  not  dead  and  is  not  Lamb's. 

As,  having  read  the  essay,  you  reflect  upon  it, 
you  will  see  how  its  emotional  power  over  you  has 
sprung  from  the  sincere  and  unexaggerated  expres- 
sion of  actual  emotions  exactly  remembered  by 
someone  who  had  an  eye  always  open  for  beauty, 
who  was,  indeed,  obsessed  by  beauty.  The  beauty 
of  old  houses  and  gardens  and  aged  virtuous  char- 
acters, the  beauty  of  children,  the  beauty  of  com- 
panionships, the  softening  beauty  of  dreams  in  an 
arm-chair  —  all  these  are  brought  together  and 
mingled  with  the  grief  and  regret  which  were  the 
origin  of  the  mood.     Why  is  Dream  Children  a 


42  LITERARY  TASTE 

classic?  It  is  a  classic  because  it  transmits  to  you, 
as  to  generations  before  you,  distinguished  emo- 
tion, because  it  makes  you  respond  to  the  throb 
of  life  more  intensely,  more  justly,  and  more  nobly. 
And  it  is  capable  of  doing  this  because  Charles 
Lamb  had  a  very  distinguished,  a  very  sensitive, 
and  a  very  honest  mind.  His  emotions  were  noble. 
He  felt  so  keenly  that  he  was  obliged  to  find  relief 
in  imparting  his  emotions.  And  his  mental  proc- 
esses were  so  sincere  that  he  could  neither  exag- 
gerate nor  diminish  the  truth.  If  he  had  lacked 
any  one  of  these  three  qualities,  his  appeal  would 
have  been  narrowed  and  weakened,  and  he  would 
not  have  become  a  classic.  Either  his  feelings 
would  have  been  deficient  in  supreme  beauty,  and 
therefore  less  worthy  to  be  imparted,  or  he  would 
not  have  had  sufficient  force  to  impart  them ;  or 
his  honesty  would  not  have  been  equal  to  the  strain 
of  imparting  them  accurately.  In  any  case,  he 
would  not  have  set  up  in  you  that  vibration  which 
we  call  pleasure,  and  which  is  supereminently  caused 
by  vitalising  participation  in  high  emotion.  As 
Lamb  sat  in  his  bachelor  arm-chair,  with  his  brother 
in  the  grave,  and  the  faithful  homicidal  maniac  by 
his  side,  he  really  did  think  to  himself,  "  This  is 
beautiful.  Sorrow  is  beautiful.  Disappointment 
is  beautiful.     Life  is  beautiful.     I  must  tell  them. 


HOW  TO  READ  A  CLASSIC  43 

I  must  make  them  understand."  Because  he  still 
makes  you  understand  he  is  a  classic.  And  now 
I  seem  to  hear  you  say,  "  But  what  about  Lamb's 
famous  literary  style  ?    Where  does  that  come  in  ?  '* 


CHAPTER    VI 

THE   QUESTION   OF    STYLE 

In  discussing  the  value  of  particular  books,  I  have 
heard  people  say  —  people  who  were  timid  about 
expressing  their  views  of  literature  in  the  presence 
of  literary  men :  "  It  may  be  bad  from  a  literary 
point  of  view,  but  there  are  very  good  things  in 
it."  Or :  "I  dare  say  the  style  is  very  bad,  but 
really  the  book  is  very  interesting  and  suggestive." 
Or :  "  I'm  not  an  expert,  and  so  I  never  bother 
my  head  about  good  style.  All  I  ask  for  is  good 
matter.  And  when  I  have  got  it,  critics  may  say 
what  they  like  about  the  book."  And  many  other 
similar  remarks,  all  showing  that  in  the  minds  of 
the  speakers  there  existed  a  notion  that  style  is 
something  supplementary  to,  and  distinguishable 
from,  matter ;  a  sort  of  notion  that  a  writer  who 
wanted  to  be  classical  had  first  to  find  and  arrange 
his  matter,  and  then  dress  it  up  elegantly  in  a 
costume  of  style,  in  order  to  please  beings  called 
literary  critics. 

This    is    a    misapprehension.     Style    cannot    be 
44 


THE  QUESTION  OF  STYLE  45 

distinguished  from  matter.  When  a  writer  con- 
ceives an  idea  he  conceives  it  in  a  form  of  words. 
That  form  of  words  constitutes  his  style,  and  it  is 
absolutely  governed  by  the  idea.  The  idea  can 
only  exist  in  words,  and  it  can  only  exist  in  one 
form  of  words.  You  cannot  say  exactly  the  same 
thing  in  two  different  ways.  Slightly  alter  the 
expression,  and  you  slightly  alter  the  idea.  Surely 
it  is  obvious  that  the  expression  cannot  be  altered 
■without  altering  the  thing  expressed !  A  writer, 
having  conceived  and  expressed  an  idea,  may,  and 
probably  will,  "  polish  it  up."  But  what  does  he 
polish  ujp?  To  say  that  he  polishes  up  his  style 
is  merely  to  say  that  he  is  polishing  up  his  idea, 
that  he  has  discovered  faults  or  imperfections  in 
his  idea,  and  is  perfecting  it.  An  idea  exists  in 
proportion  as  it  is  expressed;  it  exists  when  it  is 
expressed,  and  not  before.  It  expresses  itself.  A 
clear  idea  is  expressed  clearly,  and  a  vague  idea 
vaguely.  You  need  but  take  your  own  case  and 
your  own  speech.  For  just  as  science  is  the  devel- 
opment of  common-sense,  so  is  literature  the 
development  of  common  daily  speech.  The  dif- 
ference between  science  and  common-sense  is  simply 
one  of  degree ;  similarly  with  speech  and  litera- 
ture. Well,  when  you  "  know  what  you  think," 
you  succeed  in  saying  what  you  think,  in  making 


46  LITERARY  TASTE 

yourself  understood.  When  you  "  don't  know 
what  to  think,"  your  expressive  tongue  halts.  And 
note  how  in  daily  life  the  characteristics  of  your 
style  follow  your  mood ;  how  tender  it  is  when  you 
are  tender,  how  violent  when  you  are  violent.  You 
have  said  to  yourself  in  moments  of  emotion :  "  If 

only  I  could  write ,"  etc.     You  were  wrong. 

You  ought  to  have  said :  "  If  only  I  could  think  — 
on  this  high  plane."  When  you  have  thought 
clearly  you  have  never  had  any  difficulty  in  saying 
what  you  thought,  though  you  may  occasionally 
have  had  some  difficulty  in  keeping  It  to  yourself. 
And  when  you  cannot  express  yourself,  depend 
upon  it  that  you  have  nothing  precise  to  express, 
and  that  what  incommodes  you  is  not  the  vain 
desire  to  express,  but  the  vain  desire  to  think  more 
clearly.  All  this  just  to  illustrate  how  style  and 
matter  are  co-existent,  and  inseparable,  and  alike. 

at 

You  cannot  have  good  matter  with  bad  style. 
Examine  the  point  more  closely.  A  man  wishes 
to  convey  a  fine  idea  to  you.  He  employs  a  form 
of  words.  That  form  of  words  is  his  style.  Hav- 
ing read,  you  say :  "  Yes,  this  idea  is  fine."  The 
writer  has  therefore  achieved  his  end.  But  in 
what  Imaginable  circumstances  can  you  say: 
"Yes,  this  idea  is  fine,  but  the  style  Is  not  fine"? 


THE  QUESTION  OF  STYLE  47 

The  sole  medium  of  communication  between  you 
and  the  author  has  been  the  form  of  words.  The 
fine  idea  has  reached  you.  How.''  In  the  words, 
by  the  words.  Hence  the  fineness  must  be  in  the 
words.  You  may  say,  superiorly :  "  He  has 
expressed  himself  clumsily,  but  I  can  see  what  he 
means."  By  what  light?  By  something  in  the 
words,  in  the  style.  That  something  is  fine. 
Moreover,  if  the  style  is  clumsy,  are  you  sure  that 
you  can  see  what  he  means?  You  cannot  be  quite 
sure.  And,  at  any  rate,  you  cannot  see  distinctly. 
The  "  matter  "  is  what  actually  reaches  you,  and 
it  must  necessarily  be  affected  by  the  style. 

Still  further  to  comprehend  what  stj^le  is,  let 
me  ask  you  to  think  of  a  writer's  style  exactly  as 
you  would  think  of  the  gestures  and  manners  of 
an  acquaintance.  You  know  the  man  whose 
demeanour  is  "  always  calm,"  but  whose  passions 
are  strong.  How  do  you  know  that  his  passions 
are  strong?  Because  he  "gives  them  away"  by 
some  small,  but  important,  part  of  his  demeanour, 
such  as  the  twitching  of  a  lip  or  the  whitening  of 
the  knuckles  caused  by  clenching  the  hand.  In 
other  words,  his  demeanour,  fundamentally,  is  not 
calm.  You  know  the  man  who  is  always  "  smoothly 
polite  and  agreeable,"  but  who  affects  you  unpleas- 


48  LITERARY  TASTE 

antly.  Why  does  he  affect  you  unpleasantly? 
Because  he  is  tedious,  and  therefore  disagreeable, 
and  because  his  politeness  is  not  real  politeness. 
You  know  the  man  who  is  awkward,  shy,  clumsy, 
but  who,  nevertheless,  impresses  you  with  a  sense 
of  dignity  and  force.  Why?  Because  mingled 
with  that  awkwardness  and  so  forth  is  dignity. 
You  know  the  blunt,  rough  fellow  whom  you  in- 
stinctively guess  to  be  affectionate  —  because  there 
is  "  something  in  his  tone  "  or  "  something  in  his 
eyes."  In  every  instance  the  demeanour,  while 
perhaps  seeming  to  be  contrary  to  the  character, 
is  really  in  accord  with  it.  The  demeanour  never 
contradicts  the  character.  It  is  one  part  of  the 
character  that  contradicts  another  part  of  the 
character.  For,  after  all,  the  blunt  man  is  blunt, 
and  the  awkward  man  is  awkward,  and  these  char- 
acteristics are  defects.  The  demeanour  merely 
expresses  them.  The  two  men  would  be  better  if, 
while  conserving  their  good  qualities,  they  had  the 
superficial  attributes  of  smoothness  and  agreeable- 
ness  possessed  by  the  gentleman  who  is  unpleasant 
to  you.  And  as  regards  this  latter,  it  is  not  his 
superficial  attributes  which  are  unpleasant  to  you, 
but  his  other  qualities.  In  the  end  the  character 
is  shown  in  the  demeanour;  and  the  demeanour 
is  a  consequence   of  the  character  and  resembles 


THE  QUESTION  OF  STYLE  49 

the  character.  So  with  style  and  matter.  You 
may  argue  that  the  blunt,  rough  man's  demeanour 
is  unfair  to  his  tenderness.  I  do  not  think  so. 
For  his  churlishness  is  really  very  trying  and 
painful,  even  to  the  man's  wife,  though  a  moment's 
tenderness  will  make  her  and  you  forget  it.  The 
man  really  is  churlish,  and  much  more  often  than 
he  is  tender.  His  demeanour  is  merely  just  to 
his  character.  So,  when  a  writer  annoys  you  for 
ten  pages  and  then  enchants  you  for  ten  lines, 
you  must  not  explode  against  his  style.  You 
must  not  say  that  his  style  won't  let  his  matter 
*'  come  out."  You  must  remember  the  churlish, 
tender  man.  The  more  you  reflect,  the  more 
clearly  you  will  see  that  faults  and  excellences  of 
style  are  faults  and  excellences  of  matter  itself. 

One  of  the  most  striking  illustrations  of  this 
neglected  truth  is  Thomas  Carlyle.  How  often 
has  it  been  said  that  Carlyle's  matter  is  marred  by 
the  harshness  and  the  eccentricities  of  his  style? 
But  Carlyle's  matter  is  harsh  and  eccentric  to  pre- 
cisely the  same  degree  as  his  style  is  harsh  and 
eccentric.  Carlyle  was  harsh  and  eccentric.  His 
behaviour  was  frequently  ridiculous,  if  it  were  not 
abominable.  His  judgments  were  often  extremely 
bizarre.     When  you  read  one  of  Carlyle's  fierce 


50  LITERARY  TASTE 

diatribes,  you  say  to  yourself:  "This  Is  splendid. 
The  man's  enthusiasm  for  justice  and  truth  is 
glorious."  But  you  also  say :  "  He  is  a  little 
unjust  and  a  little  untruthful.  He  goes  too  far. 
He  lashes  too  hard."  These  things  are  not  the 
style;  they  are  the  matter.  And  when,  as  in  his 
greatest  moments,  he  is  emotional  and  restrained 
at  once,  you  say :  "  This  is  the  real  Carlyle." 
Kindly  notice  how  perfect  the  style  has  become! 
No  harshnesses  or  eccentricities  now !  And  if 
that  particular  matter  is  the  "  real "  Carlyle,  then 
that  particular  style  is  Carlyle's  "  real  "  style.  But 
when  you  say  "  real "  you  would  more  properly 
say  "best."  "This  is  the  best  Carlyle."  If 
Carlyle  had  always  been  at  his  best  he  would 
have  counted  among  the  supreme  geniuses  of 
the  world.  But  he  was  a  mixture.  His  style  is 
the  expression  of  the  mixture.  The  faults  are 
only  in  the  style  because  they  are  in  the  matter. 

at 

You  will  find  that,  in  classical  literature,  the 
style  always  follows  the  mood  of  the  matter. 
Thus,  Charles  Lamb's  essay  on  Dream  Children 
begins  quite  simply,  in  a  calm,  narrative  manner, 
enlivened  by  a  certain  quippishness  concerning 
the    children.     The    style    is    grave   when    great- 


THE  QUESTION  OF  STYLE  51 

grandmother  Field  is  the  subject,  and  when  the 
author  passes  to  a  rather  elaborate  impression 
of  the  picturesque  old  mansion  it  becomes  as  it 
were  consciously  beautiful.  This  beauty  is  in- 
tensified in  the  description  of  the  still  more  beauti- 
ful garden.  But  the  real  dividing  point  of  the 
essay  occurs  when  Lamb  approaches  his  elder 
brother.  He  unmistakably  marks  the  point  with 
the  phrase :  "  Then,  in  somewhat  a  more  heightened 
tone,  I  told  how,"  etc.  Henceforward  the  style 
increases  in  fervour  and  in  solemnity  until  the 
culmination  of  the  essay  is  reached :  *'  And  while  I 
stood  gazing,  both  the  children  gradually  grew 
fainter  to  my  view,  receding  and  still  receding 
till  nothing  at  last  but  two  mournful  features 
were  seen  in  the  uttermost  distance,  which,  with- 
out speech,  strangely  impressed  upon  me  the  ef- 
fects of  speech.  .  .  ."  Throughout,  the  style 
is  governed  by  the  matter.  "  Well,"  you  say, 
**  of  course  it  is.  It  couldn't  be  otherwise.  If  it 
were  otherwise  it  would  be  ridiculous.  A  man  who 
made  love  as  though  he  were  preaching  a  sermon, 
or  a  man  who  preached  a  sermon  as  though  he 
were  teasing  schoolboys,  or  a  man  who  described 
a  death  as  though  he  were  describing  a  practical 
joke,  must  necessarily  be  either  an  ass  or  a  luna- 
tic."    Just  so.     You  have  put  it  in  a  nutshell. 


52  LITERARY  TASTE 

You  have  disposed  of  the  problem  of  style  so  far 
as  it  can  be  disposed  of. 

But  what  do  those  people  mean  who  say :  "  I 
read  such  and  such  an  author  for  the  beauty  of 
his  style  alone  "  ?  Personally,  I  do  not  clearly 
know  what  they  mean  (and  I  have  never  been 
able  to  get  them  to  explain),  unless  they  mean 
that  they  read  for  the  beauty  of  sound  alone. 
When  you  read  a  book  there  are  only  three 
things  of  which  you  may  be  conscious:  (1)  The 
significance  of  the  words,  which  is  inseparably 
bound  up  with  the  thought.  (2)  The  look  of 
the  printed  words  on  the  page — I  do  not  suppose 
that  anybody  reads  any  author  for  the  visual 
beauty  of  the  words  on  the  page.  (3)  The  sound 
of  the  words,  either  actually  uttered  or  imagined 
by  the  brain  to  be  uttered.  Now  it  is  indubitable 
that  words  differ  in  beauty  of  sound.  To  my 
mind  one  of  the  most  beautiful  words  in  the  Eng- 
lish language  is  "  pavement."  Enunciate  it, 
study  its  sound,  and  see  what  you  think.  It  is 
also  indubitable  that  certain  combinations  of  words 
have  a  more  beautiful  sound  than  certain  other 
combinations.  Thus  Tennyson  held  that  the  most 
beautiful  line  he  ever  wrote  was: 

The  mellow  ousel  fluting  in  the  elm. 

Perhaps,   as   sound,    it   was.     Assuredly    it    makes 


THE  QUESTION  OF  STYLE  53 

a  beautiful  succession  of  sounds,  and  recalls  the 
bird-sounds  which  it  is  intended  to  describe.  But 
does  it  live  in  the  memory  as  one  of  the  rare 
great  Tennj'sonian  lines?  It  does  not.  It  has 
charm,  but  the  charm  is  merely  curious  or  pretty. 
A  whole  poem  composed  of  lines  with  no  better 
recommendation  than  that  line  has  would  remain 
merely  curious  or  pretty.  It  would  not  per- 
manently interest.  It  would  be  as  insipid  as  a 
pretty  woman  who  had  nothing  behind  her  pretti- 
ness.  It  would  not  live.  One  may  remark  in 
this  connection  how  the  merely  verbal  felicities 
of  Tennj'son  have  lost  our  esteem.  Wlio  will 
now  proclaim  the  Idylls  of  the  King  as  a  master- 
piece? Of  the  thousands  of  lines  written  by  him 
which  please  the  ear,  only  those  survive  of  which 
the  matter  is  charged  with  emotion.  No !  As 
regards  the  man  who  professes  to  read  an  author 
*'  for  his  style  alone,"  I  am  inclined  to  think  either 
that  he  will  soon  get  sick  of  that  author,  or  that 
he  is  deceiving  himself  and  means  the  author's 
general  temperament  —  not  the  author's  verbal 
style,  but  a  peculiar  quality  which  runs  through 
all  the  matter  written  by  the  author.  Just  as  one 
may  like  a  man  for  something  which  is  always  com- 
ing out  of  him,  which  one  cannot  define,  and  which 
is  of  the  very  essence  of  the  man. 


64  LITERARY  TASTE 

In  judging  the  stjle  of  an  author,  you  must 
employ  the  same  canons  as  you  use  in  judging 
men.  If  you  do  this  you  will  not  be  tempted 
to  attach  importance  to  trifles  that  are  negligible. 
There  can  be  no  lasting  friendship  without  respect. 
If  an  author's  style  is  such  that  you  cannot  respect 
it,  then  you  may  be  sure  that,  despite  any  present 
pleasure  which  you  may  obtain  from  that  author, 
there  is  something  wrong  with  his  matter,  and 
that  the  pleasure  will  soon  cloy.  You  must  ex- 
amine your  sentiments  towards  an  author.  If 
when  you  have  read  an  author  you  are  pleased, 
without  being  conscious  of  aught  but  his  melli- 
fluousness,  just  conceive  what  your  feelings  would 
be  after  spending  a  month's  holiday  with  a  merely 
mellifluous  man.  If  an  author's  style  has  pleased 
you,  but  done  nothing  except  make  you  giggle, 
then  reflect  upon  the  ultimate  tediousness  of  the 
man  who  can  do  nothing  but  jest.  On  the  other 
hand,  if  you  are  impressed  by  what  an  author  has 
said  to  you,  but  are  aware  of  verbal  clumsinesses 
in  his  work,  you  need  worry  about  his  "  bad 
style "  exactly  as  much  and  exactly  as  little  as 
you  would  worry  about  the  manners  of  a  kind- 
hearted,  keen-brained  friend  who  was  dangerous 
to  carpets  with  a  tea-cup  in  his  hand.  The 
friend's  antics  in  a  drawing-room  are  somewhat 


THE  QUESTION  OF  STYLE  55 

regrettable,  but  j^ou  would  not  say  of  him  that 
his  manners  were  bad.  Again,  if  an  author's 
style  dazzles  you  instantly  and  blinds  you  to 
everything  except  its  brilliant  self,  ask  your  soul, 
before  you  begin  to  admire  his  matter,  what  would 
be  your  final  opinion  of  a  man  who  at  the  first 
meeting  fired  his  personality  into  you  like  a  broad- 
side. Reflect  that,  as  a  rule,  the  people  whom 
you  have  come  to  esteem  communicated  themselves 
to  you  gradually,  that  they  did  not  begin  the  en- 
tertainment with  fireworks.  In  short,  look  at 
literature  as  you  would  look  at  life,  and  you  can- 
not fail  to  perceive  that,  essentially,  the  style  is 
the  man.  Decidedly  you  will  never  assert  that 
you  care  nothing  for  style,  that  your  enjoyment 
of  an  author's  matter  is  unaffected  by  his  style. 
And  you  will  never  assert,  either,  that  style  alone 
suffices  for  you. 

If  you  are  undecided  upon  a  question  of  style, 
whether  leaning  to  the  favourable  or  to  the  un- 
favourable, the  most  prudent  course  is  to  forget 
that  literary  style  exists.  For,  indeed,  as  style 
is  understood  by  most  people  who  have  not 
analysed  their  impressions  under  the  influence 
of  literature,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  literary 
style.     You    cannot    divide    literature    into    two 


56  LITERARY  TASTE 

elements  and  say:  This  is  matter  and  that  style. 
Further,  the  significance  and  the  worth  of  liter- 
ature are  to  be  comprehended  and  assessed  in  the 
same  way  as  the  significance  and  the  worth  of  any 
other  phenomenon :  by  the  exercise  of  common- 
sense.  Common-sense  will  tell  you  that  nobody, 
not  even  a  genius,  can  be  simultaneously  vulgar 
and  distinguished,  or  beautiful  and  ugly,  or 
precise  and  vague,  or  tender  and  harsh.  And 
common-sense  will  therefore  tell  you  that  to  try 
to  set  up  vital  contradictions  between  matter 
and  style  is  absurd.  When  there  is  a  superficial 
contradiction,  one  of  the  two  mutually-contra- 
dicting qualities  is  of  far  less  importance  than  the 
other.  If  you  refer  literature  to  the  standards 
of  life,  common-sense  will  at  once  decide  which 
quality  should  count  heaviest  in  your  esteem. 
You  will  be  in  no  danger  of  weighing  a  mere 
maladroitness  of  manner  against  a  fine  trait  of 
character,  or  of  letting  a  graceful  deportment 
blind  you  to  a  fundamental  vacuity.  When  in 
doubt,  ignore  style,  and  think  of  the  matter  as 
you  would  think  of  an  individual. 


CHAPTER  VII 

WRESTLING    WITH    AN    AUTHOE 

Having  disposed,  so  far  as  is  possible  and  neces- 
sary, of  that  formidable  question  of  style,  let  us 
now  return  to  Charles  Lamb,  whose  essay  on 
Dream  Children  was  the  originating  cause  of  our 
inquiry  into  style.  As  we  have  made  a  beginning 
of  Lamb,  it  will  be  well  to  make  an  end  of  him. 
In  the  preliminary  stages  of  literary  culture,  noth- 
ing is  more  helpful,  in  the  way  of  kindling  an 
interest  and  keeping  it  well  alight,  than  to 
specialise  for  a  time  on  one  author,  and  par- 
ticularly on  an  author  so  frankly  and  curiously 
"  human  "  as  Lamb  is.  I  do  not  mean  that  you 
should  imprison  yourself  with  Lamb's  complete 
works  for  three  months,  and  read  nothing  else. 
I  mean  that  you  should  regularly  devote  a  propor- 
tion of  your  learned  leisure  to  the  study  of  Lamb 
until  you  are  acquainted  with  all  that  is  important 
in  his  work  and  about  his  work.  (You  may  buy 
the  complete  works  in  prose  and  verse  of  Charles 
and  Mary  Lamb,  edited  by  that  unsurpassed  expert 
Mr.  Thomas  Hutchison.)     There  is  no  reason  why 

57 


58  LITERARY  TASTE 

you  should  not  become  a  modest  specialist  In 
Lamb.  He  is  the  very  man  for  you ;  neither  volu- 
minous, nor  difficult,  nor  uncomfortably  lofty ;  al- 
ways either  amusing  or  touching;  and — most 
important — himself  passionately  addicted  to  litera- 
ture. You  cannot  like  Lamb  without  liking  litera- 
ture in  general.  And  you  cannot  read  Lamb 
without  learning  about  literature  in  general ;  for 
books  were  his  hobby,  and  he  was  a  critic  of  the 
first  rank.  His  letters  are  full  of  literariness. 
You  will  naturally  read  his  letters;  you  should 
not  only  be  infinitely  diverted  by  them  (there  are 
no  better  epistles),  but  you  should  receive  from 
them  much  light  on  the  works. 

It  Is  a  course  of  study  that  I  am  suggesting  to 
you.  It  means  a  certain  amount  of  sustained 
effort.  It  means  slightly  more  resolution,  more 
pertinacity,  and  more  expenditure  of  brain-tissue 
than  are  required  for  reading  a  newspaper.  It 
means,  in  fact,  "  work."  Perhaps  you  did  not 
bargain  for  work  when  you  joined  me.  But  I  do 
not  think  that  the  literary  taste  can  be  satisfac- 
torily formed  unless  one  is  prepared  to  put  one's 
back  into  the  aff'alr.  And  I  may  prophesy  to  you, 
by  way  of  encouragement,  that,  in  addition  to 
the  advantages  of  familiarity  with  masterpieces, 


WRESTLING  WITH  AN  AUTHOR       59 

of  increased  literary  knowledge,  and  of  a  wide  in- 
troduction to  the  true  bookish  atmosphere  and 
"  feel "  of  things,  which  you  will  derive  from  a 
comprehensive  study  of  Charles  Lamb,  you  will 
also  be  conscious  of  a  moral  advantage — the  very 
important  and  very  inspiring  advantage  of  really 
"  knowing  something  about  something."  You 
will  have  achieved  a  definite  step ;  you  will  be 
proudly  aware  that  you  have  put  yourself  in  a 
position  to  judge  as  an  expert  whatever  you  may 
hear  or  read  in  the  future  concerning  Charles 
Lamb.  This  legitimate  pride  and  sense  of  ac- 
complishment will  stimulate  you  to  go  on  further; 
it  will  generate  steam.  I  consider  that  this  in- 
direct moral  advantage  even  outweighs,  for  the 
moment,  the  direct  literary  advantages. 

Now,  I  shall  not  shut  my  eyes  to  a  possible 
result  of  your  diligent  intercourse  with  Charles 
Lamb.  It  is  possible  that  you  may  be  disap- 
pointed with  him.  It  is — shall  I  say? — almost 
probable  that  you  will  be  disappointed  with  him, 
at  any  rate  partially.  You  will  have  expected 
more  joy  in  him  than  you  have  received.  I  have 
referred  in  a  previous  chapter  to  the  feeling  of 
disappointment  which  often  comes  from  first  con- 
tacts with  the  classics.     The  neophyte  is  apt  to 


60  LITERARY  TASTE 

find  them — I  may  as  well  out  with  the  word — 
dull.  You  may  have  found  Lamb  less  diverting, 
less  interesting,  than  you  hoped.  You  may  have 
had  to  whip  yourself  up  again  and  again  to  the 
effort  of  reading  him.  In  brief,  Lamb  has  not, 
for  you,  justified  his  terrific  reputation.  If  a 
classic  is  a  classic  because  it  gives  pleasure  to  suc- 
ceeding generations  of  the  people  who  are  most 
keenly  interested  in  literature,  and  if  Lamb  fre- 
quently strikes  you  as  dull,  then  evidently  there 
is  something  wrong.  The  difficulty  must  be 
fairly  fronted,  and  the  fronting  of  it  brings  us  to 
the  very  core  of  the  business  of  actually  forming 
the  taste.  If  your  taste  were  classical  you  would 
discover  in  Lamb  a  continual  fascination ;  where- 
as what  you  in  fact  do  discover  in  Lamb  is  a  not 
unpleasant  flatness,  enlivened  by  a  vague  humour 
and  an  occasional  pathos.  You  ought,  according 
to  theory,  to  be  enthusiastic;  but  you  are  apa- 
thetic, or,  at  best,  half-hearted.  There  is  a  gulf. 
How  to  cross  it? 

To  cross  it  needs  time  and  needs  trouble.  The 
following  considerations  may  aid.  In  the  first 
place,  we  have  to  remember  that,  in  coming  into 
the  society  of  the  classics  in  general  and  of  Charles 
Lamb  in  particular,  we  are  coming  into  the  society 


WRESTLING  WITH  AN  AUTHOR       61 

of  a  mental  superior.  What  happens  usually  in 
such  a  case?  We  can  judge  by  recalling  what 
happens  when  we  are  in  the  society  of  a  mental 
inferior.  We  say  things  of  which  he  misses  the 
import;  we  joke,  and  he  does  not  smile;  what 
makes  him  laugh  loudly  seems  to  us  horseplay  or 
childish;  he  is  blind  to  beauties  which  ravish 
us ;  he  is  ecstatic  over  what  strikes  us  as  crude ; 
and  his  profound  truths  are  for  us  trite  common- 
places. His  perceptions  are  relatively  coarse; 
our  perceptions  are  relatively  subtle.  We  try  to 
make  him  understand,  to  make  him  see,  and  if 
he  is  aware  of  his  inferiority  we  may  have  some 
success.  But  if  he  is  not  aware  of  his  inferiority, 
we  soon  hold  our  tongues  and  leave  him  alone 
in  his  self-satisfaction,  couA-inced  that  there  is 
nothing  to  be  done  with  him.  Every  one  of  us 
has  been  through  this  experience  with  a  mental 
inferior,  for  there  is  always  a  mental  inferior 
handy,  just  as  there  is  always  a  being  more  un- 
happy than  we  are.  In  approaching  a  classic,  the 
true  wisdom  is  to  place  ourselves  in  the  position 
of  the  mental  inferior,  aware  of  mental  inferiority, 
humbly  stripping  off  all  conceit,  anxious  to  rise 
out  of  that  inferiority.  Recollect  that  we  always 
regard  as  quite  hopeless  the  mental  inferior  who 
does  not  suspect  his  own  inferiority.      Our  attitude 


62  LITERARY  TASTE 

towards  Lamb  must  be :  "  Charles  Lamb  was  a 
greater  man  than  I  am,  cleverer,  sharper,  subtler, 
finer,  intellectually  more  powerful,  and  with 
keener  eyes  for  beauty.  I  must  brace  myself  to 
follow  his  lead."  Our  attitude  must  resemble  that 
of  one  who  cocks  his  ear  and  listens  with  all  his 
soul  for  a  distant  sound. 

Si 
To  catch  the  sound  we  really  must  listen. 
That  is  to  say,  we  must  read  carefully,  with  our 
faculties  on  the  watch.  We  must  read  slowly 
and  perseveringly.  A  classic  has  to  be  wooed 
and  is  worth  the  wooing.  Further,  we  must  dis- 
dain no  assistance.  I  am  not  in  favour  of  study- 
ing criticism  of  classics  before  the  classics  them- 
selves. My  notion  is  to  study  the  work  and  the 
biography  of  a  classical  writer  together,  and  then 
to  read  criticism  afterwards.  I  think  that  in  re- 
prints of  the  classics  the  customary  "  critical  intro- 
duction "  ought  to  be  put  at  the  end,  and  not  at 
the  beginning,  of  the  book.  The  classic  should  be 
allowed  to  make  his  own  impression,  however  faint, 
on  the  virginal  mind  of  the  reader.  But  after- 
wards let  explanatory  criticism  be  read  as  much  as 
you  please.  Explanatory  criticism  is  very  useful; 
nearly  as  useful  as  pondering  for  oneself  on  what 
^ne  has  read!  Explanatory  criticism  may  throw 
one  single  gleam  that  lights  up  the  entire  subject. 


WRESTLING  WITH  AN  AUTHOR       63 

Mj  second  consideration  (in  aid  of  crossing  the 
gulf)  touches  the  quality  of  the  pleasure  to  be 
derived  from  a  classic.  It  is  never  a  violent 
pleasure.  It  is  subtle,  and  it  will  wax  in  intensity, 
but  the  idea  of  violence  is  foreign  to  it.  The 
artistic  pleasures  of  an  uncultivated  mind  are 
generally  violent.  They  proceed  from  exaggera- 
tion in  treatment,  from  a  lack  of  balance,  from 
attaching  too  great  an  importance  to  one  aspect 
(usually  superficial),  while  quite  ignoring  another. 
They  are  gross,  like  the  joy  of  Worcester  sauce  on 
the  palate.  Now,  if  there  is  one  point  common  to 
all  classics,  it  is  the  absence  of  exaggeration.  The 
balanced  sanity  of  a  great  mind  makes  impossible 
exaggeration,  and  therefore,  distortion.  The 
beauty  of  a  classic  is  not  at  all  apt  to  knock  you 
down.  It  will  steal  over  you,  rather.  Many 
serious  students  are,  I  am  convinced,  discouraged 
in  the  early  stages  because  they  are  expecting  a 
wrong  kind  of  pleasure.  They  have  abandoned 
Worcester  sauce,  and  they  miss  it.  They  miss 
the  coarse  tang.  They  must  realise  that  indul- 
gence in  the  ta/ng  means  the  sure  and  total  loss  of 
sensitiveness — sensitiveness  even  to  the  tang  itself. 
They  cannot  have  crudeness  and  fineness  together. 
They  must  choose,  remembering  that  while  crude- 
ness kills  pleasure,  fineness  ever  intensifies  it. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

SYSTEM    IN    READING 

You  have  now  definitely  set  sail  on  the  sea  of 
literature.  You  are  afloat,  and  your  anchor  is  up. 
I  think  I  have  given  adequate  warning  of  the 
dangers  and  disappointments  which  await  the  un- 
wary and  the  sanguine.  The  enterprise  in  which 
you  are  engaged  is  not  facile,  nor  is  it  short.  I 
think  I  have  sufficiently  predicted  that  you  will 
have  your  hours  of  woe,  during  which  you  may 
be  inclined  to  send  to  perdition  all  writers,  together 
with  the  inventor  of  printing.  But  if  you  have 
become  really  friendly  with  Lamb;  if  you  know 
Lamb,  or  even  half  of  him ;  if  you  have  formed 
an  image  of  him  in  your  mind,  and  can,  as  it  were, 
hear  him  brilliantly  stuttering  while  you  read  his 
essays  or  letters,  then  certainly  you  are  in  a  fit 
condition  to  proceed.  And  you  want  to  know  in 
which  direction  you  are  to  proceed.  Yes,  I  have 
caught  your  terrified  and  protesting  whisper :  "  I 
hope  to  heaven  he  isn't  going  to  prescribe  a  Course 
of  English  Literature,  because  I  feel  I  shall  never 

e4i 


SYSTEM  IN  READING  65 

be  able  to  do  it!"  I  am  not.  If  your  object  in 
life  was  to  be  a  University  Extension  Lecturer  in 
English  literature,  then  I  should  prescribe  some- 
thing drastic  and  desolating.  But  as  your  object, 
so  far  as  I  am  concerned,  is  simply  to  obtain  the 
highest  and  most  tonic  form  of  artistic  pleasure  of 
which  you  are  capable,  I  shall  not  prescribe  any 
regular  course.  Nay,  I  shall  venture  to  dissuade 
you  from  any  regular  course.  No  man,  and 
assuredly  no  beginner,  can  possibly  pursue  a 
historical  course  of  literature  without  wasting  a 
lot  of  weary  time  in  acquiring  mere  knowledge 
which  will  yield  neither  pleasure  nor  advantage. 
In  the  choice  of  reading  the  individual  must  count ; 
caprice  must  count,  for  caprice  is  often  the  truest 
index  to  the  individuality.  Stand  defiantly  on 
your  own  feet,  and  do  not  excuse  yourself  to  your- 
self. You  do  not  exist  in  order  to  honour  litera- 
ture by  becoming  an  encyclopedia  of  literature. 
Literature  exists  for  your  service.  Wherever  you 
happen  to  be,  that,  for  you,  is  the  centre  of  liter- 
ature. 

Still,  for  your  own  sake  you  must  confine  your- 
self for  a  long  time  to  recognised  classics,  for 
reasons  already  explained.  And  though  you 
should    not    follow    a    course,   you    must    have    a 


66  LITERARY  TASTE 

system  or  principle.  Your  native  sagacity  will  tell 
you  that  caprice,  left  quite  unfettered,  will  end  by 
being  quite  ridiculous.  The  system  which  I  rec- 
ommend is  embodied  in  this  counsel:  Let  one 
thing  lead  to  another.  In  the  sea  of  literature 
every  part  communicates  with  every  other  part ; 
there  are  no  land-locked  lakes.  It  was  with  an 
eye  to  this  system  that  I  originally  recommended 
you  to  start  with  Lamb.  Lamb,  if  you  are  his 
intimate,  has  already  brought  you  into  relations 
with  a  number  of  other  prominent  writers  with 
whom  you  can  in  turn  be  intimate,  and  who  will  be 
particularly  useful  to  you.  Among  these  are 
Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  Southey,  Hazlitt,  and 
Leigh  Hunt.  You  cannot  know  Lamb  without 
knowing  these  men,  and  some  of  them  are  of  the 
highest  importance.  From  the  circle  of  Lamb's 
own  work  you  may  go  off  at  a  tangent  at  various 
points,  according  to  your  inclination.  If,  for 
instance,  you  are  drawn  towards  poetry,  you  can- 
not, in  all  English  literature,  make  a  better  start 
than  with  Wordsworth.  And  Wordsworth  will 
send  you  backwards  to  a  comprehension  of  the 
poets  against  whose  influence  Wordsworth  fought. 
When  you  have  understood  Wordsworth's  and 
Coleridge's  Lyrical  Ballads,  and  Wordsworth's 
defence  of  them,  you  will  be  in  a  position  to  judgq 


SYSTEM  IN  READING  67 

poetry  in  general.  If,  again,  your  mind  hankers 
after  an  earlier  and  more  romantic  literature. 
Lamb's  Specimens  of  English  Dramatic  Poets  Con- 
temporary/ with  Shakspere  has  already,  in  an  en- 
chanting fashion,  piloted  you  into  a  vast  gulf  of 
"  the  sea  which  is  Shakspere." 

Again  in  Hazlitt  and  Leigh  Hunt  j'ou  will 
discover  essayists  inferior  only  to  Lamb  himself, 
and  critics  perhaps  not  inferior.  Hazlitt  is  un- 
surpassed as  a  critic.  His  judgments  are  con- 
vincing and  his  enthusiasm  of  the  most  catching 
nature.  Having  arrived  at  Hazlitt  or  Leigh 
Hunt,  you  can  branch  off  once  more  at  any  one 
of  ten  thousand  points  into  still  wider  circles. 
And  thus  you  may  continue  up  and  down  the 
centuries  as  far  as  you  like,  yea,  even  to  Chaucer. 
If  you  chance  to  read  Hazlitt  on  Chaucer  and 
Spenser,  you  will  probably  put  your  hat  on 
instantly  and  go  out  and  buy  these  authors ; 
such  is  his  communicating  fire!  I  need  not 
particularise  further.  Commencing  with  Lamb, 
and  allowing  one  thing  to  lead  to  another,  you 
cannot  fail  to  be  more  and  more  impressed  by 
the  peculiar  suitability  to  your  needs  of  the  Lamb 
entourage  and  the  Lamb  period.  For  Lamb  lived 
in  a  time  of  universal  re-birth  in  English  literature. 


68  LITERARY  TASTE 

Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  were  re-creating 
poetry ;  Scott  was  re-creating  the  novel ;  Lamb 
was  re-creating  the  human  document ;  and  Hazlitt, 
Coleridge,  Leigh  Hunt,  and  others  were  re-creating 
criticism.  Sparks  are  flying  all  about  the  place, 
and  it  will  be  not  less  than  a  miracle  if  something 
combustible  and  indestructible  in  you  does  not 
take  fire. 

I  have  only  one  cautionary  word  to  utter.  You 
may  be  saying  to  yourself :  "  So  long  as  I  stick  to 
classics  I  cannot  go  wrong."  You  can  go  wrong. 
You  can,  while  reading  naught  but  very  fine  stuff, 
commit  the  grave  error  of  reading  too  much  of 
one  kind  of  stuff.  Now  there  are  two  kinds,  and 
only  two  kinds.  These  two  kinds  are  not  prose 
and  poetry,  nor  are  they  divided  the  one  from  the 
other  by  any  differences  of  form  or  of  subject. 
They  are  the  inspiring  kind  and  the  informing 
kind.  No  other  genuine  division  exists  in  litera- 
ture. Emerson,  I  think,  first  clearly  stated  it. 
His  terms  were  the  literature  of  "  power "  and 
the  literature  of  "  knowledge."  In  nearly  all  great 
literature  the  two  qualities  are  to  be  found  in 
company,  but  one  usually  predominates  over  the 
other.  An  example  of  the  exclusively  inspiring 
kind  is  Coleridge's  Kuhla  Khan.     I  cannot  recall 


SYSTEM  IN  READING  69 

any  first-class  example  of  the  purely  informing 
kind.  The  nearest  approach  to  it  that  I  can  name 
is  Spencer's  First  Principles,  which,  however,  is  at 
least  once  highly  inspiring.  An  example  in  which 
the  inspiring  quality  predominates  is  Ivanhoe; 
and  an  example  in  which  the  informing  quality 
predominates  is  Hazlitt's  essays  on  Shakespeare's 
characters.  You  must  avoid  giving  undue  prefer- 
ence to  the  kind  in  which  the  inspiring  quaUty 
predominates  or  to  the  kind  in  which  the  informing 
quality  predominates.  Too  much  of  the  one  is 
enervating;  too  much  of  the  other  is  desiccating. 
If  you  stick  exclusively  to  the  one  you  may  become 
a  mere  debauchee  of  the  emotions ;  if  you  stick 
exclusively  to  the  other  you  may  cease  to  live  in 
any  full  sense.  I  do  not  say  that  you  should  hold 
the  balance  exactly  even  between  the  two  kinds. 
Your  taste  will  come  into  the  scale.  What  I  say 
is  that  neither  kind  must  be  neglected. 

Lamb  is  an  instance  of  a  great  writer  whom 
anybody  can  understand  and  whom  a  majority  of 
those  who  interest  themselves  in  literature  can  more 
or  less  appreciate.  He  makes  no  excessive  demand 
either  on  the  intellect  or  on  the  faculty  of  sym- 
pathetic emotion.  On  both  sides  of  Lamb,  how- 
ever,   there    lie    literatures    more    difficult,    more 


70  LITERARY  TASTE 

recondite.  The  "  knowledge  "  side  need  not  detain 
us  here ;  it  can  be  mastered  by  concentration  and 
perseverance.  But  the  "  power  "  side,  which  com- 
prises the  supreme  productions  of  genius,  demands 
special  consideration.  You  may  have  arrived  at 
the  point  of  keenly  enjoying  Lamb  and  yet  be 
entirely  unable  to  "  see  anything  in  "  such  writ- 
ings as  Kubla  Khan  or  Milton's  Comu^;  and  as 
for  Hamlet  you  may  see  nothing  in  it  but  a  san- 
guinary tale  "  full  of  quotations."  Nevertheless 
it  is  the  supreme  productions  which  are  capable  of 
yielding  the  supreme  pleasures,  and  which  xvUl 
yield  the  supreme  pleasures  when  the  pass-key  to 
them  has  been  acquired.  This  pass-key  is  a  com- 
prehension of  the  nature  of  poetry. 


CHAPTER    IS 


VEESE 


There  Is  a  word,  a  "  name  of  fear,"  which  rouses 
terror  in  the  heart  of  the  vast  educated  majority 
of  the  Enghsh-speaking  race.  The  most  vahant 
will  fly  at  the  mere  utterance  of  that  word.  The 
most  broad-minded  will  put  their  backs  up  against 
it.  The  most  rash  will  not  dare  to  affront  it.  I 
myself  have  seen  it  empty  buildings  that  had  been 
full;  and  I  know  that  it  will  scatter  a  crowd  more 
quickly  than  a  hose-pipe,  hornets,  or  the  rumour 
of  plague.  Even  to  murmur  it  is  to  incur  solitude, 
probably  disdain,  and  possibly  starvation,  as  his- 
torical examples  show.     That  word  is  "  poetry." 

The  profound  objection  of  the  average  man  to 
poetry  can  scarcely  be  exaggerated.  And  when  I 
say  the  average  man,  I  do  not  mean  the  "  average 
sensual  man  " — any  man  who  gets  on  to  the  top 
of  the  omnibus ;  I  mean  the  average  lettered  man, 
the  average  man  who  does  care  a  little  for  books 
and   enjoys   reading,   and  knows   the   cleissics   by 

71 


72  LITERARY  TASTE 

name  and  the  popular  writers  by  having  read  them. 
I  am  convinced  that  not  one  man  in  ten  who  reads, 
reads  poetry — at  any  rate,  knowingly.  I  am  con- 
vinced, further,  that  not  one  man  in  ten  who  goes 
so  far  as  knowingly  to  buy  poetry  ever  reads  it. 
You  will  find  everywhere  men  who  read  very  widely 
in  prose,  but  who  will  say  quite  callously,  "  No, 
I  never  read  poetry."  If  the  sales  of  modem 
poetry,  distinctly  labelled  as  such,  were  to  cease 
entirely  to-morrow  not  a  publisher  would  fail; 
scarcely  a  publisher  would  be  affected;  and  not 
a  poet  would  die — for  I  do  not  believe  that  a  single 
modern  English  poet  is  living  to-day  on  the  cur- 
rent proceeds  of  his  verse.  For  a  country  which 
possesses  the  greatest  poetical  literature  in  the 
world  this  condition  of  affairs  is  at  least  odd. 
What  makes  it  odder  is  that,  occasionally,  very  occa- 
sionally, the  average  lettered  man  will  have  a  fit  of 
idolatry  for  a  fine  poet,  buying  his  books  in  tens  of 
thousands,  and  bestowing  upon  him  immense  riches. 
As  with  Tennyson.  And  what  makes  it  odder  still 
is  that,  after  all,  the  average  lettered  man  does  not 
truly  dislike  poetry ;  he  only  dislikes  it  when  it  takes 
a  certain  form.  He  will  read  poetry  and  enjoy  it, 
provided  he  is  not  aware  that  it  is  poetry.  Poetry 
can  exist  authentically  either  in  prose  or  in  verse. 
Give  him  poetry  concealed  in  prose  and  there  is  a 


VERSE  73 

chance  that,  taken  off  his  guard,  he  will  appreciate 
it.  But  show  him  a  page  of  verse,  and  he  will 
be  ready  to  send  for  a  policeman.  The  reason  of 
this  is  that,  though  poetry  may  come  to  pass 
either  in  prose  or  in  verse,  it  does  actually  happen 
far  more  frequently  in  verse  than  in  prose ;  nearly 
all  the  very  greatest  poetry  is  in  verse;  verse  is 
identified  with  the  very  greatest  poetry,  and  the 
very  greatest  poetry  can  only  be  understood  and 
savoured  by  people  who  have  put  themselves 
through  a  considerable  mental  discipline.  To 
others  it  is  an  exasperating  weariness.  Hence 
chiefly  the  fearful  prejudice  of  the  average  lettered 
man  against  the  mere  form  of  verse. 

The  formation  of  literary  taste  cannot  be  com- 
pleted until  that  prejudice  has  been  conquered. 
My  very  diflScult  task  is  to  suggest  a  method  of 
conquering  it.  I  address  myself  exclusively  to  the 
large  class  of  people  who,  if  they  are  honest,  will 
declare  that,  while  they  enjoy  novels,  essays,  and 
history,  they  cannot  "  stand "  verse.  The  case 
is  extremely  delicate,  like  all  nervous  cases.  It 
is  useless  to  employ  the  arts  of  reasoning,  for  the 
matter  has  got  beyond  logic;  it  is  instinctive. 
Perfectly  futile  to  assure  you  that  verse  will  yield 
a  higher  percentage  of  pleasure  than  prose !     You 


74  LITERARY  TASTE 

will  reply :  "  We  believe  you,  but  that  doesn't  help 
us."  Therefore  I  shall  not  argue.  I  shall  ven- 
ture to  prescribe  a  curative  treatment  (doctors 
do  not  argue)  ;  and  I  beg  you  to  follow  it  exactly, 
keeping  your  nerve  and  your  calm.  Loss  of  self- 
control  might  lead  to  panic,  and  panic  would  be 
fatal. 

First:  Forget  as  completely  as  you  can  all  your 
present  notions  about  the  nature  of  verse  and 
poetry.  Take  a  sponge  and  wipe  the  slate  of 
your  mind.  In  particular,  do  not  harass  yourself 
by  thoughts  of  metre  and  verse  forms.  Second: 
Read  William  Hazlitt's  essay  "  On  Poetry  in  Gen- 
eral." This  essay  is  the  first  in  the  book  entitled 
Lectures  on  the  English  Poets.  It  can  be  bought 
in  various  forms.  I  might  have  composed  an  essay 
of  my  own  on  the  real  harmless  nature  of  poetry 
in  general,  but  it  could  only  have  been  an  echo 
and  a  deterioration  of  Hazlitt's.  He  has  put  the 
truth  about  poetry  in  a  way  as  interesting,  clear, 
and  reassuring  as  anyone  is  ever  likely  to  put  it. 
I  do  not  expect,  however,  that  you  will  instantly 
gather  the  full  message  and  enthusiasm  of  the 
essay.  It  will  probably  seem  to  you  not  to  "  hang 
together."  Still,  it  will  leave  bright  bits  of  ideas 
in  your  mind.     Third :  After  a  week's  interval  read 


VERSE  76 

the    essay    again.     On    a    second    perusal    it    will 
appear  more  persuasive  to  you. 

Fourth:  Open  the  Bible  and  read  the  fortieth 
chapter  of  Isaiah.  It  is  the  chapter  which  begins, 
*'  Comfort  ye,  comfort  ye,  my  people,"  and  ends, 
"  They  shall  run  and  not  be  weary,  and  they  shall 
walk  and  not  faint."  This  chapter  will  doubtless 
be  more  or  less  familiar  to  you.  It  cannot  fail 
(whatever  your  particular  ism)  to  impress  you, 
to  generate  in  your  mind  sensations  which  you 
recognise  to  be  of  a  lofty  and  unusual  order,  and 
which  you  will  admit  to  be  pleasurable.  You  will 
probably  agree  that  the  result  of  reading  this 
chapter  (even  if  your  particular  ism,  is  opposed 
to  its  authority)  is  finer  than  the  result  of  read- 
ing a  short  story  in  a  magazine  or  even  an  essay 
by  Charles  Lamb.  Now,  the  pleasurable  sensations 
induced  by  the  fortieth  chapter  of  Isaiah  are 
among  the  sensations  usually  induced  by  high-class 
poetry.  The  writer  of  it  was  a  very  great  poet, 
and  what  he  wrote  is  a  very  great  poem.  Fifth: 
After  having  read  it,  go  back  to  Hazlitt,  and  see 
if  you  can  find  anything  in  Hazlitt's  lecture  which 
throws  light  on  the  psychology  of  your  own  emo- 
tions upon  reading  Isaiah. 


76  LITERARY  TASTE 

Sixth:  The  next  step  is  into  unmistakable  verse. 
It  is  to  read  one  of  Wordsworth's  short  narrative 
poems,  The  Brothers.  There  are  many  editions 
of  Wordsworth,  but  I  should  advise  the  "  Golden 
Treasury  "  Wordsworth,  because  it  contains  the 
famous  essay  by  Matthew  Arnold,  who  made  the 
selection.  I  want  you  to  read  this  poem  aloud. 
You  will  probably  have  to  hide  yourself  some- 
where in  order  to  do  so,  for,  of  course,  you  would 
not,  as  yet,  care  to  be  overheard  spouting  poetry. 
Be  good  enough  to  forget  that  The  Brothers  is 
poetry.  The  Brothers  is  a  short  story,  with  a 
plain,  clear  plot.  Read  it  as  such.  Read  it  sim- 
ply for  the  story.  It  is  very  important  at  this 
critical  stage  that  you  should  not  embarrass  your 
mind  with  preoccupations  as  to  the  form  in  which 
Wordsworth  has  told  his  story.  Wordsworth's 
object  was  to  tell  a  story  as  well  as  he  could: 
just  that.  In  reading  aloud  do  not  pay  any  more 
attention  to  the  metre  than  you  feel  naturally 
inclined  to  pay.  After  a  few  lines  the  metre  will 
present  itself  to  you.  Do  not  worry  as  to  what 
kind  of  metre  it  is.  When  you  have  finished  the 
perusal,  examine  your  sensations.     .     .     . 

Your  sensations  after  reading  this  poem,  and 
perhaps    one    or    two    other    narrative    poems    of 


VERSE  77 

Wordsworth,  such  as  Michael,  will  be  different 
from  the  sensations  produced  In  you  by  reading 
an  ordinary,  or  even  a  very  extraordinary,  short 
story  in  prose.  They  may  not  be  so  sharp,  so 
clear  and  piquant,  but  they  will  probably  be,  in 
their  mysteriousness  and  their  vagueness,  more 
impressive.  I  do  not  say  that  they  will  be  divert- 
ing. I  do  not  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  they  will 
strike  you  as  pleasing  sensations.  (Be  it  remem- 
bered that  I  am  addressing  myself  to  an  Imaginary 
tyro  in  poetry.)  I  would  qualify  them  as  being 
**  disturbing."  Well,  to  disturb  the  spirit  is  one 
of  the  greatest  aims  of  art.  And  a  disturbance 
of  spirit  is  one  of  the  finest  pleasures  that  a  highly- 
organised  man  can  enjoy.  But  this  truth  can 
only  be  really  learnt  by  the  repetitions  of  experi- 
ence. As  an  aid  to  the  more  exhaustive  exami- 
nation of  your  feelings  under  Wordsworth,  in 
order  that  you  may  better  understand  what  he 
was  trying  to  effect  in  you,  and  the  means  which 
he  employed,  I  must  direct  you  to  Wordsworth 
himself.  Wordsworth,  in  addition  to  being  a 
poet,  was  unsurpassed  as  a  critic  of  poetry. 
What  Hazlitt  does  for  poetry  in  the  way  of  cre- 
ating enthusiasm  Wordsworth  does  in  the  way  of 
philosophic  explanation.  And  Wordsworth's  ex- 
planations of  the  theory  and  practice  of  poetry 


78  LITERARY  TASTE 

are  written  for  the  plain  man.  They  pass  the 
comprehension  of  nobody,  and  their  direct,  unas- 
suming, and  calm  simplicity  is  extremely  persuasive. 
Wordsworth's  chief  essays  in  throwing  light  on 
himself  are  the  "  Advertisement,"  "  Preface,"  and 
"  Appendix "  to  Lyrical  Ballads;  the  letters  to 
Lady  Beaumont  and  "  the  Friend  "  and  the  "  Pref- 
ace "  to  the  Poems  dated  1815.  All  this  matter 
is  strangely  interesting  and  of  immense  educa- 
tional value.  It  is  the  first-class  expert  talking 
at  ease  about  his  subject.  The  essays  relating  to 
Lyrical  Ballads  will  be  the  most  useful  for  you. 
You  will  discover  these  precious  documents  in  a 
volume  entitled  Wordsworth's  Literary  Criticism, 
edited  by  that  distinguished  Wordsworthian  Mr 
Nowell  C.  Smith.  It  is  essential  that  the  student 
of  poetry  should  become  possessed,  honestly  or 
dishonestly,  either  of  this  volume  or  of  the  matter 
which  it  contains.  Those  who  have  not  read 
Wordsworth  on  poetry  can  have  no  idea  of  the 
naive  charm  and  the  helpful  radiance  of  his  ex- 
pounding. I  feel  that  I  cannot  too  strongly  press 
Wordsworth's  criticism  upon  you. 

Between  Wordsworth  and  Hazlitt  you  will 
learn  all  that  it  behoves  you  to  know  of  the  nature, 
the  aims,  and  the  results  of  poetry.     It  is  no  part 


VERSE  79 

of  my  scheme  to  idot  the  "  i's  "  and  cross  the  "  t's  " 
of  Wordsworth  and  Hazlitt.  I  best  fulfil  my  pur- 
pose in  urgently  referring  you  to  them.  I  have 
only  a  single  point  of  my  own  to  make — a  psy- 
chological detail.  One  of  the  main  obstacles  to 
the  cultivation  of  poetry  in  the  average  sensible 
man  is  an  absurdly  inflated  notion  of  the  ridicu- 
lous. At  the  bottom  of  that  man's  mind  is  the  idea 
that  poetry  is  "  silly."  He  also  finds  it  exag- 
gerated and  artificial ;  but  these  two  accusations 
against  poetry  can  be  satisfactorily  answered. 
The  charge  of  silliness,  of  being  ridiculous,  how- 
ever, cannot  be  refuted  by  argument.  There  is 
no  logical  answer  to  a  guff^aw.  This  sense  of  the 
ridiculous  is  merely  a  bad,  infantile  habit,  in  itself 
grotesquely  ridiculous.  You  may  see  it  particularly 
in  the  theatre.  Not  the  greatest  dramatist,  not  the 
greatest  composer,  not  the  greatest  actor  can  pre- 
vent an  audience  from  laughing  uproariously  at  a 
tragic  moment  if  a  cat  walks  across  the  stage.  But 
why  ruin  the  scene  by  laughter?  Simply  because 
the  majority  of  any  audience  is  artistically  childish. 
This  sense  of  the  ridiculous  can  only  be  crushed  by 
the  exercise  of  moral  force.  It  can  only  be  cowed. 
If  you  are  inclined  to  laugh  when  a  poet  expresses 
himself  more  powerfully  than  you  express  your- 
self, when  a  poet  talks  about  feelings  which  are 


80  LITERARY  TASTE 

not  usually  mentioned  in  daily  papers,  when  a  poet 
uses  words  and  images  which  lie  outside  youn 
vocabulary  and  range  of  thought,  then  you  had 
better  take  yourself  in  hand.  You  have  to  decide 
whether  you  will  be  on  the  side  of  the  angels  or 
on  the  side  of  the  nincompoops.  There  is  no  surer 
sign  of  imperfect  development  than  the  impulse 
to  snigger  at  what  is  unusual,  naive,  or  exuberant. 
And  if  you  choose  to  do  so,  you  can  detect  the 
cat  walking  across  the  stage  in  the  sublimest  pas- 
sages of  literature.  But  more  advanced  souls  will 
grieve  for  you. 

The  study  of  Wordsworth's  criticism  makes  the 
seventh  step  in  my  course  of  treatment.  The 
eighth  is  to  return  to  those  poems  of  Wordsworth's 
which  you  have  already  perused,  and  read  them 
again  in  the  full  light  of  the  author's  defence  and 
explanation.  Read  as  much  Wordsworth  as  you 
find  you  can  assimilate,  but  do  not  attempt  either 
of  his  long  poems.  The  time,  however,  is  now 
come  for  a  long  poem.  I  began  by  advising  nar- 
rative poetry  for  the  neophyte,  and  I  shall  per- 
severe with  the  prescription.  I  mean  narrative 
poetry  in  the  restricted  sense;  for  epic  poetry  is 
narrative.  Paradise  Lost  is  narrative ;  so  is  The 
Prelude.     I  suggest  neither  of  these  great  works. 


VERSE  81 

My  choice  falls  on  Elizabeth  Browning's  Aurora 
Leigh.  If  you  once  work  yourself  "  into  "  this 
poem,  interesting  yourself  primarily  (as  with 
Wordsworth)  in  the  events  of  the  story,  and  not 
allowing  yourself  to  be  obsessed  by  the  fact  that 
what  you  are  reading  is  "  poetry  " — if  you  do 
this,  you  are  not  likely  to  leave  it  unfinished.  And 
before  you  reach  the  end  you  will  have  encoun- 
tered en  route  pretty  nearly  all  the  moods  of 
poetry  that  exist :  tragic,  humorous,  ironic,  elegiac, 
lyric — everything.  You  will  have  a  comprehen- 
sive acquaintance  with  a  poet's  mind.  I  guaran- 
tee that  you  will  come  safely  through  if  you  treat 
the  work  as  a  novel.  For  a  novel  it  effectively  is, 
and  a  better  one  than  any  written  by  Charlotte 
Bronte  or  George  Eliot.  In  reading,  it  would  be 
well  to  mark,  or  take  note  of,  the  passages  which 
give  you  the  most  pleasure,  and  then  to  compare 
these  passages  with  the  passages  selected  for  praise 
by  some  authoritative  critic.  Aurora  Leigh  can 
be  got  in  the  "  Temple  Classics,"  or  in  the  "  Can- 
terbury Poets."  The  indispensable  biographical 
information  about  IMrs  Browning  can  be  obtained 
from  Mr  J.  H.  Ingram's  short  Life  of  her  in  the 
"  Eminent  Women  "  Series,  or  from  Robert  Brown- 
ing, by  William  Sharp  ("  Great  Writers  "  Series). 


82  LITERARY  TASTE 

This  accomplished,  you  may  begin  to  choose 
your  poets.  Going  back  to  Hazlitt,  you  will  see 
that  he  deals  with,  among  others,  Chaucer,  Spenser, 
Shakespeare,  Milton,  Dryden,  Pope,  Chatterton, 
Burns,  and  the  Lake  School.  You  might  select 
one  of  these,  and  read  under  his  guidance.  Said 
Wordsworth :  "  I  was  impressed  by  the  conviction 
that  there  were  four  English  poets  whom  I  must 
have  continually  before  me  as  examples — Chaucer, 
Shakespeare,  Spenser,  and  Milton."  (A  word  to 
the  wise!)  Wordsworth  makes  a  fifth  to  these 
four.  Concurrently  with  the  careful,  enthusiastic 
study  of  one  of  the  undisputed  classics,  modem 
verse  should  be  read.  (I  beg  you  to  accept  the 
following  statement:  that  if  the  study  of  classical 
poetry  inspires  you  with  a  distaste  for  modem 
poetry,  then  there  is  something  seriously  wrong 
in  the  method  of  your  development.)  You  may 
at  this  stage  (and  not  before)  commence  an  in- 
quiry into  questions  of  rhythm,  verse-structure, 
and  rhyme.  There  is,  I  believe,  no  good,  concise, 
cheap  handbook  to  English  prosody ;  yet  such  a 
manual  is  greatly  needed.  The  only  one  with 
which  I  am  acquainted  is  Tom  Hood  the  younger's 
Rules  of  Rhyme:  A  Guide  to  English  Versification. 
Again,  the  introduction  to  Walker's  Rhyming 
Dictionary  gives  a  fairly  clear  elementary  account 


VERSE  83 

of  the  subject.  Ruskin  also  has  written  an  excel- 
lent essay  on  verse-rhythms.  With  a  manual  in 
front  of  you,  you  can  acquire  in  a  couple  of  hours 
a  knowledge  of  the  formal  principles  in  which  the 
music  of  English  verse  is  rooted.  The  business 
is  trifling.  But  the  business  of  appreciating  the 
inmost  spirit  of  the  greatest  verse  is  tremendous 
and  lifelong.  It  is  not  something  that  can  be 
"  got  up." 


CHAPTER    X 


BROAD    COUNSELS 


I  HAVE  now  set  down  what  appear  to  me  to  be 
the  necessary  considerations,  recommendations, 
exhortations,  and  dehortations  In  aid  of  this 
delicate  and  arduous  enterprise  of  forming  the 
literary  taste.  I  have  dealt  with  the  theory  of 
literature,  with  the  psychology  of  the  author,  and 
— quite  as  important — with  the  psychology  of 
the  reader.  I  have  tried  to  explain  the  author 
to  the  reader  and  the  reader  to  himself.  To  go 
into  further  detail  would  be  to  exceed  my  original 
intention,  with  no  hope  of  ever  bringing  the  con- 
stantly-enlarging scheme  to  a  logical  conclusion. 
My  aim  is  not  to  provide  a  map,  but  a  compass — 
two  very  different  instruments.  In  the  way  of 
general  advice  it  remains  for  me  only  to  put  before 
you  three  counsels  which  apply  more  broadly  than 
any  I  have  yet  offered  to  the  business  of  reading. 
You  have  within  yourself  a  touchstone  by  which 
finally  you  can,  and  you  must,  test  every  book  that 
your  brain  is   capable  of  comprehending.     Does 

8^ 


BROAD  COUNSELS  85 

tlie  book  seem  to  you  to  be  sincere  and  true?  If 
it  does,  then  jou  need  not  worry  about  your  im- 
mediate feelings,  or  the  possible  future  conse- 
quences of  the  book.  You  will  ultimately  like  the 
book,  and  you  will  be  justified  in  liking  it.  Hon- 
esty, in  literature  as  in  life,  is  the  quality  that 
counts  first  and  counts  last.  But  beware  of  your 
immediate  feelings.  Truth  is  not  always  pleas- 
ant. The  first  glimpse  of  truth  is,  indeed,  usually 
so  disconcerting  as  to  be  positively  unpleasant, 
and  our  impulse  is  to  tell  it  to  go  away,  for  we 
will  have  no  truck  with  it.  If  a  book  arouses 
your  genuine  contempt,  you  may  dismiss  it  from 
your  mind.  Take  heed,  however,  lest  you  con- 
fuse contempt  with  anger.  If  a  book  really  moves 
you  to  anger,  the  chances  are  that  it  is  a  good 
book.  Most  good  books  have  begun  by  causing 
anger  which  disguised  itself  as  contempt.  De- 
manding honesty  from  your  authors,  you  must  see 
that  you  render  it  yourself.  And  to  be  honest  with 
oneself  is  not  so  simple  as  it  appears.  One's  sen- 
sations and  one's  sentiments  must  be  examined 
with  detachment.  When  you  have  violently  flung 
down  a  book,  listen  whether  you  can  hear  a  faint 
voice  saying  within  you :  "  It's  true,  though ! " 
And  if  you  catch  the  whisper,  better  yield  to  it 
as  quickly  as  you  can.     For  sooner  or  later  the 


86  LITERARY  TASTE 

voice  will  win.  Similarly,  when  you  are  hugging 
a  book,  keep  your  ear  cocked  for  the  secret  warn- 
ing: "  Yes,  but  it  isn't  true."  For  bad  books,  by 
flattering  you,  by  caressing,  by  appeahng  to  the 
weak  or  the  base  in  you,  will  often  persuade  you 
what  fine  and  splendid  books  they  are.  (Of 
course,  I  use  the  word  "  true  "  in  a  wide  and  essen- 
tial significance.  I  do  not  necessarily  mean  true 
to  literal  fact ;  I  mean  true  to  the  plane  of  experi- 
ence in  which  the  book  moves.  The  truthfulness 
of  IvanhoCy  for  example,  cannot  be  estimated  by 
the  same  standards  as  the  truthfulness  of  Stubbs's 
Constitutional  History.)  In  reading  a  book,  a 
sincere  questioning  of  oneself,  "  Is  it  true  ?  "  and  a 
loyal  abiding  by  the  answer,  will  help  more  surely 
than  any  other  process  of  ratiocination  to  form 
the  taste.  I  will  not  assert  that  this  question 
and  answer  are  all-sufficient.  A  true  book  is  not 
always  great.     But  a  great  book  is  never  untrue. 

My  second  counsel  is:  In  your  reading  you 
must  have  in  view  some  definite  aim — some  aim 
other  than  the  wish  to  derive  pleasure.  I  con- 
ceive that  to  give  pleasure  is  the  highest  end  of 
any  work  of  art,  because  the  pleasure  procured 
from  any  art  is  tonic,  and  transforms  the  life  into 
which  it  enters.     But  the  maximum   of  pleasure 


BROAD  COUNSELS  87 

can  only  be  obtained  by  regular  effort,  and  regular 
effort  implies  the  organisation  of  that  effort. 
Open-air  walking  is  a  glorious  exercise ;  it  is  the 
walking  itself  which  is  glorious.  Nevertheless, 
when  setting  out  for  walking  exercise,  the  sane 
man  generally  has  a  subsidiary  aim  in  view.  He 
says  to  himself  either  that  he  will  reach  a  given 
point,  or  that  he  will  progress  at  a  given  speed 
for  a  given  distance,  or  that  he  will  remain  on 
his  feet  for  a  given  time.  He  organises  his  effort, 
partly  in  order  that  he  may  combine  some  other 
advantage  with  the  advantage  of  walking,  but 
principally  in  order  to  be  sure  that  the  effort  shall 
be  an  adequate  effort.  The  same  with  reading. 
Your  paramount  aim  in  poring  over  literature  is 
to  enjoy,  but  you  will  not  fully  achieve  that  aim 
unless  you  have  also  a  subsidiary  aim  which  neces- 
sitates the  measurement  of  your  energy.  Your 
subsidiary  aim  may  be  sesthetic,  moral,  political, 
religious,  scientific,  erudite ;  you  may  devote  your- 
self to  a  man,  a  topic,  an  epoch,  a  nation,  a  branch 
of  literature,  an  idea — you  have  the  widest  latitude 
in  the  choice  of  an  objective;  but  a  definite  ob- 
jective you  must  have.  In  my  earlier  remarks 
as  to  method  in  reading,  I  advocated,  without 
insisting  on,  regular  hours  for  study.  But  I  both 
advocate  and  insist  on  the  fixing  of  a  date  for  the 


88  LITERARY  TASTE 

accomplishment  of  an  allotted  task.  As  an  in- 
stance, it  is  not  enough  to  say :  "  I  will  inform 
myself  completely  as  to  the  Lake  School."  It 
is  necessary  to  say :  "  I  will  inform  myself  com- 
pletely as  to  the  Lake  School  before  I  am  a  year 
older."  Without  this  precautionary  steeling  of 
the  resolution  the  risk  of  a  humihating  collapse 
into  futility  is  enormously  magnified. 

at 

My  third  counsel  is:  Buy  a  library.  It  is 
obvious  that  you  cannot  read  unless  you  have 
books.  I  began  by  urging  the  constant  purchase 
of  books — any  books  of  approved  quality,  without 
reference  to  their  immediate  bearing  upon  your 
particular  case.  The  moment  has  now  come  to 
inform  you  plainly  that  a  bookman  is,  amongst 
other  things,  a  man  who  possesses  many  books. 
A  man  who  does  not  possess  many  books  is  not 
a  bookman.  For  years  literary  authorities  have 
been  favouring  the  literary  public  with  wondrously 
selected  lists  of  "  the  best  books  " — the  best  novels, 
the  best  histories,  the  best  poems,  the  best  works 
of  philosophy — or  the  hundred  best  or  the  fifty 
best  of  all  sorts.  The  fatal  disadvantage  of  such 
lists  is  that  they  leave  out  large  quantities  of  litera- 
ture which  is  admittedly  first-class.  The  bookman 
cannot  content  himself  with  a  selected  library. 
He   wants,    as    a   minimum,    a   library    reasonably 


BROAD  COUNSELS  89 

complete  in  all  departments.  With  such  a  basis 
acquired,  he  can  afterwards  wander  into  those  spe- 
cial byways  of  book-buying  which  happen  to  suit 
his  special  predilections.  Every  Englishman  who 
is  interested  in  any  branch  of  his  native  literature, 
and  who  respects  himself,  ought  to  own  a  compre- 
hensive and  inclusive  library  of  English  literature, 
in  comely  and  adequate  editions.  You  may  sup- 
pose that  this  counsel  is  a  counsel  of  perfection. 
It  is  not.  Mark  Pattison  laid  down  a  rule  that  he 
who  desired  the  name  of  book-lover  must  spend  five 
per  cent,  of  his  income  on  books.  The  proposal 
does  not  seem  extravagant,  but  even  on  a  smaller 
percentage  than  five  the  average  reader  of  these 
pages  may  become  the  owner,  in  a  comparatively 
short  space  of  time,  of  a  reasonably  complete 
English  library,  by  which  I  mean  a  library  con- 
taining the  complete  works  of  the  supreme 
geniuses,  representative  important  works  of  all 
the  first-class  men  in  all  departments,  and  speci- 
men works  of  all  the  men  of  the  second  rank  whose 
reputation  is  really  a  living  reputation  to-day. 
The  scheme  for  a  library,  which  I  now  present, 
begins  before  Chaucer  and  ends  with  George 
Gissing,  and  I  am  fairly  sure  that  the  majority 
of  people  will  be  startled  at  the  total  inexpensive- 
ness  of  it.  So  far  as  I  am  aware,  no  such  scheme 
has  ever  been  printed  before. 


CHAPTER    XI 

AN  ENGLISH  LIBRAEY  :  PERIOD  I  * 

For  the  purposes  of  book-buying,  I  divide  English 
literature,  not  strictly  into  historical  epochs,  but 
into  three  periods  which,  while  scarcely  arbitrary 
from  the  historical  point  of  view,  have  nevertheless 
been  calculated  according  to  the  space  which  they 
will  occupy  on  the  shelves  and  to  the  demands  which 
they  will  make  on  the  purse: 

I.  From  the  beginning  to  John  Dryden,  or 
roughly,  to  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

II.  From  William  Congreve  to  Jane  Austen,  or 
roughly,  the  eighteenth  century. 

III.  From  Sir  Walter  Scott  to  the  last  deceased 
author  who  is  recognised  as  a  classic,  or  roughly, 
the  nineteenth  century. 

Period  III.  will  bulk  the  largest  and  cost  the 
most,  not  necessarily  because  it  contains  more  abso- 
lutely great  books  than  the  other  periods  (though 

*  For  much  counsel  and  correction  in  the  matter  of  edi- 
tions I  am  indebted  to  my  old  and  valued  friend,  Charles 
Young,  head  of  the  firm  of  Lamley  &  Co.,  booksellers. 
South  Kensington. 

90 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  I     91 

in  mj  opinion  it  does),  but  because  it  is  nearest  to 
us,  and  therefore  fullest  of  interest  for  us. 

I  have  not  confined  my  choice  to  books  of  purely 
literary  interest — that  is  to  say,  to  works  which 
are  primarily  works  of  literary  art.  Literature  is 
the  vehicle  of  philosophy,  science,  morals,  religion, 
and  history ;  and  a  library  which  aspires  to  be  com- 
plete must  comprise,  in  addition  to  imaginative 
works,  all  these  branches  of  intellectual  activity. 
Comprising  all  these  branches,  it  cannot  avoid  com- 
prising works  of  which  the  purely  literary  interest 
is  almost  nil. 

On  the  other  hand,  I  have  excluded  from 
consideration : — 

i.  Works  whose  sole  importance  is  that  they 
form  a  link  in  the  chain  of  development.  For 
example,  nearly  all  the  productions  of  authors 
between  Chaucer  and  the  beginning  of  the 
Elizabethan  period,  such  as  Gower,  Hoccleve, 
and  Skelton,  whose  works,  for  sufficient  reason, 
are  read  only  by  professors  and  students  who  mean 
to  be  professors. 

ii.  Works  not  originally  written  in  English,  such 
as  the  works  of  that  very  great  philosopher  Roger 
Bacon,  of  whom  this  isle  ought  to  be  prouder  than 
it  is.  To  this  rule,  however,  I  have  been  con- 
strained to  make  a  few  exceptions.     Sir  Thomas 


92  LITERARY  TASTE 

More's  Utopia  was  written  in  Latin,  but  one  does 
not  easily  conceive  a  library  to  be  complete  without 
it.  And  could  one  exclude  Sir  Isaac  Newton's 
Principia,  the  masterpiece  of  the  greatest  physicist 
that  the  world  has  ever  seen?  The  law  of  gravity 
ought  to  have,  and  does  have,  a  powerful  senti- 
mental interest  for  us. 

iii.  Translations    from   foreign    literature    into 
English. 

Here,  then,  are  the  lists  for  the  first  period: 
Pkose  Weiteks. 

Bede,  Ecclesiastical  History:  Temple  Classics. 

Sir  Thomas  Malory,  Morte  d' Arthur:  Everyman's 
Library  (4  vols.). 

Sir  Thomas  More,  Utopia:  Scott  Library. 

George  Cavendish,  Life  of  Cardinal  Wolsey:  New 
Universal  Library. 

Richard  Hakluyt,  Voyages:  Everyman's  Library 
(8  vols.). 

Richard  Hooker,  Ecclesiastical  Polity:  Everyman's 
Library  (2  vols.). 

Francis  Bacon,  Works:  Newnes's  Thin-paper  Clas- 
sics. 

Thomas  Dekker,  Gull's  Horn-Booh:  King's  Clas- 
sics. 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  I     93 

Lord  Herbert  of  Cherbury,  Autobiography :  Scott 
Library. 

John  Selden,  Table-Talh:  New  Universal  Library. 

Thomas  Hobbes,  Leviathan:  New  Universal  Library. 

James  Howell,  Familiar  Letters:  Temple  Classics 
(3  vols.). 

Sir  Thomas  Browne,  Religio  Medici,  etc.:  Every- 
man's Library. 

Jeremy  Taylor,  Holy  Living  and  Holy  Dying:  Tem- 
ple Classics   (3  vols.). 

IzAAK  Walton,  Compleat  Angler:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

John  Bunyan,  Pilgrim's  Progress:  World's  Classics. 

Sir  William  Temple,  Essay  on  Gardens  of  Epi- 
curus: King's  Classics. 

John  Evelyn,  Diary:  Everyman's  Library  (2  vols.). 

Samuel  Pepys,  Diary:  Everyman's  Library  (2  vols.). 

The  principal  omission  from  the  above  list  is  The 
Paston  Letters,  which  I  should  probably  have  in- 
cluded had  the  enterprise  of  publishers  been  suffi- 
cient to  put  an  edition  on  the  market  at  a  cheap 
price.  Other  omissions  include  the  works  of 
Caxton  and  Wyclif,  and  such  books  as  Camden's 
Britannia,  Ascham's  Schoolmaster,  and  Fuller's 
Worthies,  whose  lack  of  first-rate  value  as  litera- 
ture is  not  adequately  compensated  by  their  his- 
torical interest.  As  to  the  Bible,  in  the  first  place 
it  is  a  translation,  and  in  the  second  I  assume  that 
you  already  possess  a  copy. 


94  LITERARY  TASTE 

Poets. 

Beowulf,  Routledge's  London  Library. 

Geoffrey  Chaucer,  Works:  Globe  Edition. 

Nicholas  Udall,  Ralph  Roister-Doister:  Temple 
Dramatists. 

Edmund  Spenser,  Works:  Globe  Edition. 

Thomas  Lodge,  Rosalynde :  Caxton  Series. 

Robert  Greene,  Tragical  Reign  of  Selimus:  Temple 
Dramatists. 

Michael  Drayton,  Poems:  Newnes's  Pocket  Clas- 
sics. 

Christopher  Marlowe,  Works:  New  Universal  Li- 
brary. 

William  Shakespeare,  Works:  Globe  Edition. 

Thomas  Campion,  Poems:  Muses'  Library. 

Ben  Jonson,  Plays:  Canterbury  Poets. 

John  Donne,  Poems:  Muses'  Library  (2  vols.). 

John  Webster,  Cyril  Tourneur,  Plays:  Mermaid 
Series. 

Philip  Massinger,  Plays:  Cunningham  Edition. 

Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  Plays:  Canterbury  Poets. 

John  Ford,  Plays:  Mermaid  Series. 

George  Herbert,  The  Temple:  Everyman's  Library. 

Robert  Herrick,  Poems:  Muses'  Library  (2  vols.). 

Edmund  Waller,  Poems:  Muses'  Library  (2  vols.). 

Sir  John  Suckling,  Poems:  Muses'  Library. 

Abraham  Cowley,  English  Poems:  Cambridge  Uni- 
versity Press. 

Richard  Crashaw,  Poems:  Muses'  Library. 

Henry  Vaughan,  Poems:  Methuen's  Little  Library. 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  I     95 

Samuel  Butler,  Hudibras:  Cambridge  University 
Press. 

John  Milton,  Poetical  Works:  Oxford  Cheap  Edi- 
tion. 

John  Milton,  Select  Prose  Works:  Scott  Library. 

Andrew  Marvell,  Poems:  Methuen's  Little  Library. 

John  Dryden,  Poetical  Works:  Globe  Edition. 

[Thomas  Percy],  Reliques  of  Ancient  English  Po- 
etry: Everyman's  Library  (2  vols.). 

Arber's  "Spenser"  Anthology:  Oxford  University 
Press. 

Arber's  "  Jonson"  Anthology:  Oxford  University 
Press. 

Arber's  "  Shakspere  "  Anthology :  Oxford  University 
Press. 

There  were  a  number  of  brilliant  minor  writers 
in  the  seventeenth  century  whose  best  work,  often 
trifling  in  bulk,  either  scarcely  merits  the  acquisi- 
tion of  a  separate  volume  for  each  author,  or 
cannot  be  obtained  at  all  in  a  modern  edition.  Such 
authors,  however,  may  not  be  utterly  neglected  in 
the  formation  of  a  library.  It  is  to  meet  this  diffi- 
culty that  I  have  included  the  last  three  volumes 
on  the  above  list.  Professor  Arber's  anthologies 
are  full  of  rare  pieces,  and  comprise  admirable 
specimens  of  the  verse  of  Samuel  Daniel,  Giles 
Fletcher,  Countess  of  Pembroke,  James  I.,  George 
Peele,  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  Thomas  Sackville,  Sir 


96  LITERARY  TASTE 

Philip  Sidney,  Drummond  of  Hawthornden, 
Thomas  Heywood,  George  Wither,  Sir  Henry 
Wotton,  Sir  William  Davenant,  Thomas  Randolph, 
Frances  Quarles,  James  Shirley,  and  other  greater 
and  lesser  poets. 

I  have  included  all  the  important  Elizabethan 
dramatists  except  John  Marston,  all  the  editions 
of  whose  works,  according  to  my  researches,  are 
out  of  print. 

In  the  Elizabethan  and  Jacobean  periods  talent 
was  so  extraordinarily  plentiful  that  the  standard 
of  excellence  is  quite  properly  raised,  and  certain 
authors  are  thus  relegated  to  the  third,  or  ex- 
cluded, class  who  in  a  less  fertile  period  would 
have  counted  as  at  least  second-class. 

Summary  of  the  First  Period. 

19  prose  authors  in  36  volumes 
29  poets  in  36 

48  72 

In  addition,  scores  of  authors  of  genuine  interest 
are  represented  in  the  anthologies. 


CHAPTER    XII 

AN    ENGLISH    LIBRARY:    PERIOD   II 

After,  dealing  with  the  formation  of  a  library  of 
authors  up  to  John  Dryden,  I  must  logically 
arrange  next  a  scheme  for  the  period  covered 
roughly  by  the  eighteenth  century.  There  is, 
however,  no  reason  why  the  student  in  quest  of 
a  library  should  follow  the  chronological  order. 
Indeed,  I  should  advise  him  to  attack  the  nine- 
teenth century  before  the  eighteenth,  for  the  reason 
that,  unless  his  taste  happens  to  be  peculiarly 
"  Augustan,"  he  will  obtain  a  more  immediate 
satisfaction  and  profit  from  his  acquisitions  in  the 
nineteenth  century  than  in  the  eighteenth.  There 
is  in  eighteenth-century  literature  a  considerable 
proportion  of  what  I  may  term  "  unattractive  ex- 
cellence," which  one  must  have  for  the  purposes 
of  completeness,  but  which  may  await  actual 
perusal  until  more  pressing  and  more  human  books 
have  been  read.  I  have  particularly  in  mind  the 
philosophical  authors  of  the  century. 
97 


98  LITERARY  TASTE 

Prose  Writers. 

John  Locke,  Philosophical  Works:  Bohn's  Edition 
(2  vols.)- 

Sir  Isaac  Newton,  Principia  (sections  1,  2,  and  3): 
Macmillans. 

Gilbert  Burnet,  History  of  His  Own  Time:  Every- 
man's Library. 

William  Wycherley,  Best  Plays:  Mermaid  Series. 

William  Congreve,  Best  Plays:  Mermaid  Series. 

Jonathan  Swift,  Tale  of  a  Tub:  Scott  Library. 

Jonathan  Swift,  Gulliver's  Travels:  Temple  Clas- 
sics. 

Daniel  Defoe,  Robinson  Crusoe:  World's  Classics. 

Daniel  Defoe,  Journal  of  the  Plague  Year:  Every- 
man's Library. 

Joseph  Addison,  Sir  Richard  Steele,  Essays:  Scott 
Library. 

William  Law,  Serious  Call:  Everyman's  Library. 

Lady  Mary  W.  Montagu,  Letters:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

George  Berkeley,  Principles  of  Human  Knorvledge: 
New  Universal  Library. 

Samuel  Richardson,  Clarissa  (abridged) :  Rout- 
ledge's  Edition. 

John  Wesley,  Journal:  Everyman's  Library  (4 
vols.). 

Henry  Fielding,  Tom  Jones:  Routledge's  Edition. 

Henry  Fielding,  Amelia:  Routledge's  Edition. 

Henry  Fielding,  Joseph  Andrews:  Routledge's  Edi- 
tion, 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  II     99 

David  Hume,  Essays:  World's  Classics. 

Laurence  Sterne,  Tristram  Shandy:  World's  Clas- 
sics. 

Laurence  Sterne,  Sentimental  Journey:  New  Uni- 
versal Library. 

Horace  Walpole,  Castle  of  Otranto:  King's  Classics. 

Tobias  Smollett,  Humphrey  Clinker:  Routledge's 
Edition. 

Tobias  Smollett,  Travels  through  France  and  Italy: 
World's  Classics. 

Adam  Smith,  Wealth  of  Nations:  World's  Classics 
(2  vols.). 

Samuel  Johnson,  Lives  of  the  Poets:  World's  Clas- 
sics (2  vols.). 

Samuel  Johnson,  Rasselas:  New  Universal  Library. 

James  Boswell,  Life  of  Johnson:  Globe  Edition. 

Oliver  Goldsmith,  Works:  Globe  Edition. 

Henry  Mackenzie,  The  Man  of  Feeling:  Cassell's 
National  Library. 

Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  Discourses  on  Art:  Every- 
man's Library. 

Edmund  Burke,  Reflections  on  the  French  Revolu- 
tion: Scott  Library. 

Edmund  Burke,  Thoughts  on  the  Present  Discon- 
tents: New  Universal  Library. 

Edward  Gibbon,  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Roman  Em- 
pire: World's  Classics  (7  vols.). 

Thomas  Paine,  Rights  of  Man:  Watts  and  Co.'s  Edi- 
tion. 

Richard  Brinsley  Sheridan,  Plays:  World's  Clas- 
sics. 

Fanny  Burney,  Evelina:  York  Library. 


100  LITERARY  TASTE 

Gilbert  White^  Natural  History  of  Selborne:  Every- 
man's Library. 

Arthur  Young,  Travels  in  France:  York  Library, 

MuNGo  Park,  Travels:  Everyman's  Library. 

Jeremy  Bentham,  Introduction  to  the  Principles  of 
Morals:  Clarendon  Press. 

Thomas  Robert  Malthus,  Essay  on  the  Principle  of 
Population:  Ward,  Lock's  Edition. 

William  Godwin,  Caleb  Williams:  Newnes's  Edition. 

Maria  Edgeworth,  Helen:  Macmillan's  Illustrated 
Edition. 

Jane  Austen,  Novels:  Nelson's  New  Century  Library 
(2  vols.). 

James  Morier,  Hadji  Baba:  Macmillan's  Illustrated 
Novels. 

The  principal  omissions  here  are  Jeremy  Collier, 
whose  outcry  against  the  immorality  of  the  stage 
is  his  slender  title  to  remembrance;  Richard 
Bentley,  whose  scholarship  principally  died  with 
him,  and  whose  chief  works  are  no  longer  current ; 
and  "  Junius,"  who  would  have  been  deservedly 
forgotten  long  ago  had  there  been  a  contempo- 
raneous Sherlock  Holmes  to  ferret  out  his  identity. 

Poets. 

Thomas  Otway,  Venice  Preserved:  Temple  Dram- 
atists. 

Matthew  Prior,  Poems  on  Several  Occasions:  Cam- 
bridge English  Classics. 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  II     101 

John  Gay,  Poems:  jNIuses'  Library  (2  vols.). 
Alexander  Pope,  Works:  Globe  Edition. 
Isaac  Watts,  Hymns:  Any  hymn-book. 
James  Thomson,  The  Seasons:  ^Muses'  Library. 
Charles  Wesley,  Hymns:  Any  hymn-book. 
Thomas  Gray,  Samuel  Johnson,  William  Collins, 

Poems:  Muses'  Library. 
James    Macpherson    (Ossian),    Poems:    Canterbury 

Poets. 
Thomas    Chatterton,    Poems:    Muses'    Library    (2 

vols.). 
William  Cowper,  Poems:  Canterbury  Poets. 
William  Cowper,  Letters:  World's  Classics. 
George  Crabbe,  Poems:  Methuen's  Little  Library. 
William  Blake,  Poems:  Muses'  Library. 
William  Lisle  Bowles,  Hartley  Coleridge,  Poems: 

Canterbury  Poets. 
Robert  Burns,  Works:  Globe  Edition. 

Summary  of   the  Period. 

S9  prose  writers  in  59  volumes. 
18  poets  "18 

57  77 


CHAPTER    Xni 

AN    ENGLISH    UBKAEY:    PERIOD    m 

The  catalogue  of  necessary  authors  of  this  third 
and  last  period  being  so  long,  it  is  convenient  to 
divide  the  prose  writers  into  Imaginative  and 
Non-imaginative. 

In  the  latter  half  of  the  period  the  question  of 
copyright  affects  our  scheme  to  a  certain  extent, 
because  It  affects  prices.  Fortunately  It  is  the  fact 
that  no  single  book  of  recognised  first-rate  general 
importance  Is  conspicuously  dear.  Nevertheless, 
I  have  encountered  difficulties  In  the  second  rank ;  I 
have  dealt  with  them  in  a  spirit  of  compromise. 
I  think  I  may  say  that,  though  I  should  have  in- 
cluded a  few  more  authors  had  their  books  been 
obtainable  at  a  reasonable  price,  I  have  omitted 
none  that  I  consider  indispensable  to  a  thoroughly 
representative  collection.  No  living  author  is 
included. 

Where  I  do  not  specify  the  edition  of  a  book 
the  original  copyright  edition  is  meant. 
102 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  III    103 

Prose  Writers:  Imaginative. 

Sir  Walter  Scott,  Waverley,  Heart  of  Midlothian, 
Quentin  Durward,  Redgauntlet,  Ivanhoe:  Every- 
man's Library  (5  vols.). 

Sir  Walter  Scott,  Marmion,  etc.:  Canterbury  Poets. 

Charles  Lamb,  Works  in  Prose  and  Verse:  Claren- 
don Press  (2  vols.). 

Charles  Lamb,  Letters:  Newnes's  Thin  Paper  Clas- 
sics. 

Walter  Savage  Landor,  Imaginary  Conversations: 
Scott  Library. 

Walter  Savage  Landor,  Poems:  Canterbury  Poets. 

Leigh  Hunt,  Essays  and  Sketches:  World's  Classics. 

Thomas  Love  Peacock,  Principal  Novels:  New  Uni- 
versal Library  (2  vols.). 

Mary  Russell  Mitford,  Our  Village:  Scott  Library. 

Michael  Scott,  Tom  Cringle's  Log:  Macmillan's 
Illustrated  Novels. 

Frederick  Marry  at,  Mr  Midshipman  Easy:  Every- 
man's Library. 

John  Galt,  Annals  of  the  Parish:  New  Universal  Li- 
brary. 

Susan  Ferrier,  Marriage:  Routledge's  Edition. 

Douglas  Jerrold,  Mrs  Caudle's  Curtain  Lectures: 
World's  Classics. 

Lord  Lytton,  Last  Days  of  Pompeii:  Everyman's 
Library. 

William  Carleton,  Stories:  Scott  Library. 

Charles  James  Lever,  Harry  Lorrequer:  Everyman's 
Library. 


104  LITERARY  TASTE 

Harrison  Ainsvvorth,  The  Tower  of  London:  New 
Universal  Library. 

George  Henry  Borrow,  Bible  in  Spain,  Lavengro: 
New  Universal  Library  (2  vols.). 

Lord  Beaconsfield,  Sybil,  Coningsby:  Lane's  New 
Pocket  Library  (2  vols.). 

W.  M.  Thackeray,  Vanity  Fair,  Esmond:  Every- 
man's Library  (2  vols.). 

W.  M.  Thackeray,  Barry  Lyndon,  and  Roundabout 
Papers,  etc.:  Nelson's  New  Century  Library. 

Charles  Dickens,  Works:  Everyman's  Library  (18 
vols.). 

Charles  Reade,  The  Cloister  and  the  Hearth: 
Everyman's  Library. 

Anthony  Trollope,  Barchester  Towers,  Framley 
Parsonage:  Lane's  New  Pocket  Library  (2 
vols.). 

Charles  Kingsley,  Westward  Ho!:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

Henry  Kingsley,  Ravenshoe :  Everyman's  Library. 

Charlotte  Bronte,  Jane  Eyre,  Shirley,  Villette, 
Professor,  and  Poems:  World's  Classics  (4  vols.). 

Emily  Bronte,  Wuthering  Heights:  World's  Clas- 
sics. 

Elizabeth  Gaskell,  Cranford:  World's  Classics. 

Elizabeth  Gaskell,  Life  of  Charlotte  Bronte. 

George  Eliot,  Adam  Bede,  Silas  Marner,  The  Mill 
on  the  Floss:  Everyman's  Library  (3  vols.). 

G.  J.  Whyte-Melville,  The  Gladiators:  New  Uni- 
versal Library. 

Alexander  Smith,  Dreamthorpe :  New  Universal  Li- 
brary. 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  III    105 

George  ^Iacdonald,  Malcolm. 

Walter  Pater,  Imaginary  Portraits. 

WiLKiE  Collins,  The  Woman  in  White. 

R.  D.  Blackmore,  Lorna  Doone:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

Samuel  Butler,  Erewhon:  Fifield's  Edition. 

Laurence  Oliphant,  Altiora  Peto. 

Margaret  Oliphant,  Salem  Chapel:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

Richard  Jefferies,  Story  of  my  Heart. 

Lewis  Carroll,  Alice  in  Wonderland:  Macmillan's 
Cheap  Edition. 

John  Henry  Shorthouse,  John  Inglesant:  Macmil- 
lan's Pocket  Classics. 

R.  L.  Stevenson,  Master  of  Ballantrae,  Virginihus 
Puerisque:  Pocket  Edition  (2  vols.). 

George  Gissing,  The  Odd  Women:  Popular  Edition 
(bound). 

Names  such  as  those  of  Charlotte  Yonge  and 
Dinah  Craik  are  omitted  intentionally. 

Prose  Writers:  Non-imaginative. 

William  Hazlitt,  Spirit  of  the  Age:  World's  Clas- 
sics. 

William  Hazlitt,  English  Poets  and  Comic  Writers: 
Bohn's  Library. 

Francis  Jeffrey,  Essays  from  Edinburgh  Review: 
New  Universal  Library. 

Thomas  de  Quincey,  Confessions  of  an  English 
Opium-eater,  etc.:  Scott  Library. 

Sydney  Smith,  Selected  Papers:  Scott  Library. 


106  LITERARY  TASTE 

George  Finlay,  Byzantine  Empire:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

John  G.  Lockhart,  Life  of  Scott:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

Agnes  Strickland,  Life  of  Queen  Elizabeth:  Every- 
man's Library. 

Hugh  Miller,  Old  Red  Sandstone:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

J.  H.  Newman,  Apologia  pro  vita  sua:  New  Uni- 
versal Library. 

Lord  Macaulay,  History  of  England  (3),  Essays 
(2):  Everyman's  Library  (5  vols.). 

A.  P.  Stanley,  Memorials  of  Canterbury:  Every- 
man's Library. 

Thomas  Carlyle,  FrencJi  Revolution  (2),  Cromwell 
(3),  Sartor  Resartus  and  Heroes  and  Hero-Wor- 
ship  (1):  Everyman's  Library  (6  vols.). 

Thomas  Carlyle,  Latter-day  Pamphlets:  Chapman 
and  Hall's  Edition. 

Charles  Darwin,  Origin  of  Species:  Murray's  Edi- 
tion. 

Charles  Darwin,  Voyage  of  the  Beagle:  Everyman's 
Library. 

A.  W.  Kinglake,  Eothen:  New  Universal  Library. 

John  Stuart  Mill,  Auguste  Comte  and  Positivism: 
New  Universal  Library. 

John  Brown,  Horce  Subsecivce:  World's  Classics. 

John  Brown,  Rab  and  His  Friends:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

Sir  Arthur  Helps,  Friends  in  Council:  New  Uni- 
versal Library. 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  III    107 

Mark  Pattison,  Life  of  Milton:  English  Men  of 
Letters  Series. 

F.  W.  Robertson,  On  Religion  and  Life:  Everyman's 
Library. 

Benjamin"  Jowett,  Interpretation  of  Scripture: 
Routledge's  London  Library. 

George  Henry  Lewes,  Principles  of  Success  in  Lit- 
erature: Scott  Library. 

Alexander  Bain,  Mind  and  Body. 

James  Anthony  Froude,  Dissolution  of  the  Monas- 
teries, etc.:  New  Universal  Library. 

Mary  W.  Shelley,  Vindication  of  the  Rights  of 
Women:  Scott  Library. 

John  Tyndal,  Glaciers  of  the  Alps:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

Sir  Henry  Maine,  Ancient  Law:  New  Universal  Li- 
brary. 

John  Ruskin,  Seven  Lamps  (1),  Sesame  and  Lilies 
(1),  Stones  of  Venice  (3):  George  Allen's  Cheap 
Edition   (5  vols.). 

Herbert  Spencer,  First  Principles. 

Herbert  Spencer,  Education. 

Sir  Richard  Burton,  Narrative  of  a  Pilgrimage  to 
Mecca:  Bohn's  Edition  (2  vols.). 

J.  S.  Speke,  Sources  of  the  Nile:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

Thomas  Henry  Huxley,  Essays:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

E.  A.  Freeman,  Europe:  Macmillan's  Primers. 

William  Stubbs,  Early  Plantagenets. 

Walter  Bagehot,  Lombard  Street. 

jRiCHARD  Holt  Hutton,  Cardinal  Newman. 


108  LITERARY  TASTE 

Sir  John  Seeley,  Ecce  Homo:  New  Universal  Li- 
brary. 

David  Masson,  Thomas  de  Quincey:  English  Men  of 
Letters  Series. 

John  Richard  Green,  Short  History  of  the  English 
People. 

Sir  Leslie  Stephen,  Pope:  English  Men  of  Letters 
Series. 

Lord  Acton,  On  the  Study  of  History. 

Mandell  Creighton,  The  Age  of  Elizabeth. 

F.  W.  H.  Myers,  Wordsworth:  English  Men  of  Let- 
ters Series. 

The  following  authors  are  omitted,  I  think  jus- 
tifiably:;— Hallam,  Whewell,  Grote,  Faraday, 
Herschell,  Hamilton,  John  Wilson,  Richard  Owen, 
Stirling  Maxwell,  Buckle,  Oscar  Wilde,  P.  G. 
Hamerton,  F.  D.  Maurice,  Henry  Sidgwick,  and 
Richard  Jebb. 

Lastly,  here  is  the  list  of  poets.  In  the  matter 
of  price  per  volume  it  is  the  most  expensive  of  all 
the  lists.  This  is  due  to  the  fact  that  it  contains 
a  larger  proportion  of  copyright  works.  Where 
I  do  not  specify  the  edition  of  a  book,  the  original 
copyright  edition  is  meant: 

Poets. 

William  Wordsworth,  Poetical  Works:  Oxford  Edi- 
tion. 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  III    109 

William  Wordsworth,  Literary  Criticism:  Nowell 
Smith's  Edition. 

Robert  Southey,  Poems:  Canterbury  Poets. 

Robert  Southey,  Life  of  Nelson:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

S.  T.  Coleridge,  Poetical  Works:  Newnes's  Thin 
Paper  Classics. 

S.  T.  Coleridge,  Biographia  Literaria:  Everyman's 
Library. 

S.  T.  Coleridge,  Lectures  on  Shakspere:  Everyman's 
Library. 

John  Keats,  Poetical  Works:  Oxford  Edition. 

Percy  Bysshe  Shelley,  Poetical  Works:  Oxford 
Edition. 

Lord  Byron,  Poems:  E.  Hartley  Coleridge's  Edition. 

Lord  Byron,  Letters:  Scott  Library. 

Thomas  Hood,  Poems:  World's  Classics. 

James  and  Horace  Smith,  Rejected  Addresses:  New 
Universal  Library. 

John  Keble,  The  Christian  Year:  Canterbury  Poets. 

George  Darley,  Poems:  Muses'  Library. 

T.  L.  Beddoes,  Poems:  Muses'  Library. 

Thomas  Moore,  Selected  Poems:  Canterbury  Poets. 

James  Clarence  Mangan,  Poems:  D.  J.  O'Dono- 
ghue's  Edition. 

W.  Mackworth  Praed,  Poems:  Canterbury  Poets. 

R.  S.  Hawker,  Cornish  Ballads:  C.  E.  Byles's  Edi- 
tion. 

Edward  FitzGerald,  Omar  Khayyam:  Golden  Treas- 
ury Series. 


no  LITERARY  TASTE 

P.  J.  Bailey,  Festus:  Routledge's  Edition. 

Arthur  Hugh  Clough,  Poems:  Muses'  Library. 

Lord  Tennyson,  Poetical  Works:  Globe  Edition. 

Robert  Browning,  Poetical  Works:  World's  Clas- 
sics (2  vols.). 

Elizabeth  Browning,  Aurora  Leigh:  Temple  Clas- 
sics. 

Elizabeth  Browning,  Shorter  Poems:  Canterbury 
Poets. 

P.  B.  Marston,  Song-tide:  Canterbury  Poets. 

Aubrey  de  Verb,  Legends  of  St.  Patrick:  Cassell's 
National  Library. 

Matthew  Arnold,  Poems:  Golden  Treasury  Series. 

Matthew  Arnold,  Essays:  Everyman's  Library. 

Coventry  Patmore,  Poems:  Muses'  Library. 

Sydney  Dobell,  Poems:  Canterbury  Poets. 

Eric  Mackay,  Love-letters  of  a  Violinist:  Canterbury 
Poets. 

T.  E.  Brown,  Poems. 

C.  S.  Calverley,  Verses  and  Translations. 

D.  G.  Rossetti,  Poetical  Works. 

Christina  Rossetti,  Selected  Poems:  Golden  Treas- 
ury Series. 

James  Thomson,  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

Jean  Ingelow,  Poems:  Red  Letter  Library. 

William  Morris,  The  Earthly  Paradise. 

William  Morris,  Early  Romances:  Everyman's  Li- 
brary. 

Augusta  Webster,  Selected  Poems. 

W.  E.  Henley,  Poetical  Works. 

Francis  Thompson,  Selected  Poems, 


AN  ENGLISH  LIBRARY:  PERIOD  III    111 

Poets  whom  I  have  omitted  after  hesitation  are: 
Ebenezer  Elliott,  Thomas  Woolner,  William 
Barnes,  Gerald  Massey,  and  Charles  Jeremiah 
Wells.  On  the  other  hand,  I  have  had  no  hesita- 
tion about  omitting  David  Moir,  Felicia  Hemans, 
Aytoun,  Sir  Edwin  Ai*nold,  and  Sir  Lewis  Morris. 
I  have  included  John  Keble  in  deference  to  much 
enlightened  opinion,  but  against  my  inclination. 
There  are  two  names  in  the  list  which  may  be  some- 
what unfamiliar  to  many  readers.  James  Clarence 
Mangan  is  the  author  of  My  Dark  Rosaleen,  an 
acknowledged  masterpiece,  which  every  library 
must  contain.  T.  E.  Brown  is  a  great  poet,  rec- 
ognised as  such  by  a  few  hundred  people,  and 
assuredly  destined  to  a  far  wider  fame.  I  have 
included  FitzGerald  because  Omar  Khayyam  is 
much  less  a  translation  than  an  original  work. 

Summary  of  the  Nineteenth  Centuey. 

83  prose-writers,  in  140  volumes. 
38  poets  "     46 

121  186 


113  LITERARY  TASTE 

Gkand  Summary  of  Complete  Library. 


1.  To  Dryden     .      . 

2.  Eighteenth  Century 

3.  Nineteenth  Century 


ithors, 

,    Volumes. 

48 

72 

57 

77 

121 

186 

226  335 


The  total  cost  of  this  library  is  surprisingly  small. 
By  laying  out  the  sum  of  12  cents  a  day  for  three 
years  you  may  become  the  possessor  of  a  collection 
of  books  which,  for  range  and  completeness  in  all 
branches  of  literature,  will  bear  comparison  with 
libraries  far  more  imposing,  more  numerous,  and 
more  expensive. 

When  you  have  read,  wholly  or  in  part,  a 
majority  of  these  three  hundred  and  thirty-five 
volumes,  with  enjoyment,  you  may  begin  to  whisper 
to  3'ourself  that  your  literary  taste  is  formed ;  and 
you  may  pronounce  judgment  on  modern  works 
which  come  before  the  bar  of  your  opinion  in  the 
calm  assurance  that,  though  to  err  is  human,  you 
do  at  any  rate  know  what  you  are  talking  about. 


CHAPTER   XIV 

MENTAL    STOCKTAKING 

Great  books  do  not  spring  from  something  acci- 
dental in  the  great  men  who  wrote  them.  They 
are  the  effluence  of  their  very  core,  the  expression 
of  the  life  itself  of  the  authors.  And  literature 
cannot  be  said  to  have  served  its  true  purpose  until 
it  has  been  translated  into  the  actual  life  of  him 
who  reads.  It  does  not  succeed  until  it  becomes 
the  vehicle  of  the  vital.  Progress  is  the  gradual 
result  of  the  unending  battle  between  human  rea- 
son and  human  instinct,  in  which  the  former  slowly 
but  surely  wins.  The  most  powerful  engine  in 
this  battle  is  literature.  It  is  the  vast  reservoir 
of  true  ideas  and  high  emotions — and  life  is  con- 
stituted of  ideas  and  emotions.  In  a  world  de- 
prived of  literature,  the  intellectual  and  emotional 
activity  of  all  but  a  few  exceptionally  gifted  men 
would  quickly  sing  and  retract  to  a  narrow  circle. 
The  broad,  the  noble,  the  generous  would  tend  to 
disappear  for  want  of  accessible  storage.  And 
life  would  be  correspondingly  degraded,  because 
the  fallacious  idea  and  the  petty  emotion  would 
113 


114  LITERARY  TASTE 

never  feel  the  upward  pull  of  the  ideas  and  emotions 
of  genius.  Only  by  conceiving  a  society  without 
literature  can  it  be  clearly  realised  that  the  func- 
tion of  literature  is  to  raise  the  plain  towards  the 
top  level  of  the  peaks.  Literature  exists  so  that 
where  one  man  has  lived  finely  ten  thousand  may 
afterwards  live  finely.  It  is  a  means  of  life;  it 
concerns  the  living  essence. 

Of  course,  literature  has  a  minor  function,  that 
of  passing  the  time  in  an  agreeable  and  harmless 
fashion,  by  giving  momentary  faint  pleasure. 
Vast  multitudes  of  people  (among  whom  may  be 
numbered  not  a  few  habitual  readers)  utilise  only 
this  minor  function  of  literature;  by  implication 
they  class  it  with  golf,  bridge,  or  soporifics. 
Literary  genius,  however,  had  no  intention  of  com- 
peting with  these  devices  for  fleeting  the  empty 
hours ;  and  all  such  use  of  literature  may  be  left 
out  of  account. 

You,  O  serious  student  of  many  volumes,  be- 
lieve that  you  have  a  sincere  passion  for  reading. 
You  hold  literature  in  honour,  and  your  last  wish 
would  be  to  debase  it  to  a  paltry  end.  You  are 
not  of  those  who  read  because  the  clock  has  just 
struck  nine  and  one  can't  go  to  bed  till  eleven. 
You  are  animated  by  a  real  desire  to  get  out  of 


MENTAL  STOCKTAKING  115 

literature  all  that  literature  will  give.  And  in 
that  aim  you  keep  on  reading,  year  after  year,  and 
the  grey  hairs  come.  But,  amid  all  this  steady 
tapping  of  the  reservoir,  do  you  ever  take  stock 
of  what  you  have  acquired?  Do  you  ever  pause 
to  make  a  valuation,  in  terms  of  your  own  life,  of 
that  which  you  are  daily  absorbing,  or  imagine 
you  are  absorbing?  Do  you  ever  satisfy  yourself 
by  proof  that  you  are  absorbing  anything  at  all, 
that  the  living  waters,  instead  of  vitalising  you, 
are  not  running  off  you  as  though  you  were  a 
duck  in  a  storm?  Because,  if  you  omit  this  mere 
business  precaution,  it  may  well  be  that  you,  too, 
without  knowing  it,  are  little  by  little  joining  the 
triflers  who  read  only  because  eternity  is  so  long. 
It  may  well  be  that  even  your  alleged  sacred  pas- 
sion is,  after  all,  simply  a  sort  of  drug-habit.  The 
suggestion  disturbs  and  worries  you.  You  dismiss 
it  impatiently ;  but  it  returns. 

How  (you  ask,  unwillingly)  can  a  man  perform 
a  mental  stocktaking?  How  can  he  put  a  value 
on  what  he  gets  from  books?  How  can  he 
effectively  test,  in  cold  blood,  whether  he  is  receiv- 
ing from  literature  all  that  literature  has  to  give 
him? 

The  test  is  not  so  vague,  nor  so  difficult,  as 
might  appear. 


116  LITERARY  TASTE 

If  a  man  is  not  thrilled  by  intimate  contact  with 
nature:  with  the  sun,  with  the  earth,  which  is  his 
origin  and  the  arouser  of  his  acutest  emotions — 

If  he  is  not  troubled  by  the  sight  of  beauty  in 
many  forms — 

If  he  is  devoid  of  curiosity  concerning  his 
fellow-men  and  his  fellow-animals — 

If  he  does  not  have  glimpses  of  the  unity  of 
all  things  in  an  orderly  progress — 

If  he  is  chronically  "  querulous,  dejected,  and 
envious  " — 

If  he  is  pessimistic — 

If  he  is  of  those  who  talk  about  "  this  age  of 
shams,"  "  this  age  without  ideals,"  "  this  hyster- 
ical age,"  and  this  heaven-knows-what-age — 

Then  that  man,  though  he  reads  undisputed 
classics  for  twenty  hours  a  day,  though  he  has  a 
memory  of  steel,  though  he  rivals  Person  in 
scholarship  and  Sainte  Beuve  in  judgment,  is  not 
receiving  from  literature  what  literature  has  to 
give.  Indeed,  he  is  chiefly  wasting  his  time. 
Unless  he  can  read  differently,  it  were  better  for 
him  if  he  sold  all  his  books,  gave  to  the  poor,  and 
played  croquet.  He  fails  because  he  has  not  as- 
similated into  his  existence  the  vital  essences  which 
genius  put  into  the  books  that  have  merely  passed 
before  his  eyes;  because  genius  has   offered  him 


MENTAL  STOCKTAKING  IIT 

faith,  courage,  vision,  noble  passion,  curiosity, 
love,  a  thirst  for  beauty,  and  he  has  not  taken  the 
gift ;  because  genius  has  offered  him  the  chance  of 
living  fully,  and  he  is  only  half  alive,  for  it  is  only 
in  the  stress  of  fine  ideas  and  emotions  that  a  man 
may  be  truly  said  to  live.  This  is  not  a  moral 
invention,  but  a  simple  fact,  which  will  be  attested 
by  all  who  know  what  that  stress  is. 

St 
What !     You  talk  learnedly  about  Shakespeare's 
sonnets !     Have   you   heard    Shakespeare's   terrific 
shout : 

Full  many  a  glorious  morning  have  I  seen 
Flatter  the  mountain-tops  with  sovereign  eye, 

Kissing  with  golden  face  the  meadows  green. 
Gilding  pale  streams  with  heavenly  alchemy. 

And  yet  can  you  see  the  sun  over  the  viaduct  at 
Loughborough  Junction  of  a  morning,  and  catch 
its  rays  in  the  Thames  off  Dewar's  whisky  monu- 
ment, and  not  shake  with  the  joy  of  life.?  If  so, 
you  and  Shakespeare  are  not  yet  in  communication. 
What!  You  pride  yourself  on  your  beautiful 
edition  of  Casaubon's  translation  of  Marcus 
Aurelius,  and  you  savour  the  cadences  of  the 
famous : 

This  day  I  shall  have  to  do  with  an  idle,  curious 
man,  with  an  unthankful  man,  a  railer,  a  crafty,  false. 


118  LITERARY  TASTE 

or  an  envious  man.  All  these  ill  qualities  have  hap- 
pened unto  him^  through  ignorance  of  that  which  is 
truly  good  and  truly  bad.  But  I  that  understand  the 
nature  of  that  which  is  good,  that  it  only  is  to  be  de- 
sired, and  of  that  which  is  bad,  that  it  only  is  truly 
odious  and  shameful:  who  know,  moreover,  that  this 
transgressor,  whosoever  he  be,  is  my  kinsman,  not  by 
the  same  blood  and  seed,  but  by  participation  of  the 
same  reason  and  of  the  same  divine  particle — how  can 
I  be  hurt?     .     .     . 

And  with  these  cadences  In  your  ears  you  go  and 
quarrel  with  a  cabman! 

at 

You  would  be  ashamed  of  your  literary  self  to 
be  caught  In  Ignorance  of  Whitman,  who  wrote : 

Now  understand  me  well — it  is  provided  in  the  es- 
sence of  things  that  from  any  fruition  of  success,  no 
matter  what,  shall  come  forth  something  to  make  a 
greater  struggle  necessary. 

And  yet,  having  achieved  a  motor-car,  you  lose 
your  temper  when  It  breaks  down  half-way  up 
a  hill! 

You  know  your  Wordsworth,  who  has  been 
trying  to  teach  you  about : 

The  Upholder  of  the  tranquil  soul 
That  tolerates  the  indignities  of  Time 
And,  from  the  centre  of  Eternity 


MENTAL  STOCKTAKING  119 

All  finite  motions  over-ruling,  lives 
In  glory  immutable. 

But  you  are  capable  of  being  seriously  unhappy 
when  your  suburban  train  selects  a  tunnel  for  its 
repose ! 

St 

And  the  A.  V.  of  the  Bible,  which  you  now  read, 
not  as  your  forefathers  read  it,  but  with  an 
aesthetic  delight,  especially  in  the  Apocrypha! 
You  remember: 

Whatsoever  is  brought  upon  thee,  take  cheerfully, 
and  be  patient  when  thou  art  changed  to  a  low  estate. 
For  gold  is  tried  in  the  fire  and  acceptable  men  in  the 
furnace  of  adversity. 

And  yet  you  are  ready  to  lie  down  and  die  because 
a  woman  has  scorned  you !     Go  to ! 

You  think  some  of  my  instances  approach  the 
ludicrous?  They  do.  They  are  meant  to  do  so. 
But  they  are  no  more  ludicrous  than  life  itself. 
And  they  illustrate  in  the  most  workaday  fashion 
how  you  can  test  whether  your  literature  fulfils 
its  function  of  informing  and  transforming  your 
existence. 

I  say  that  if  daily  events  and  scenes  do  not 
constantly  recall  and  utilise  the  ideas  and  emotions 


120  LITERARY  TASTE 

contained  In  the  books  which  jou  have  read  or 

are  reading;  if  the  memory  of  these  books  does 

not  quicken  the  perception   of  beauty,   wherever 

you  happen  to  be,  does  not  help  you  to  correlate 

the  particular  trifle  with  the  universal,  does  not 

smooth  out  irritation  and  give  dignity  to  sorrow — 

then  you   are,   consciously   or  not,   unworthy   of 

your  high  vocation  as  a  bookman.     You  may  say 

that  I  am  preaching  a  sermon.     The  fact  Is,  I  am. 

My  mood  is  a  severely  moral  mood.     For  when 

I  reflect  upon  the  diff'erence  between  what  books 

have   to    off^er   and   what   even   relatively   earnest 

readers  take  the  trouble  to  accept  from  them,  I  am 

appalled  (or  should  be  appalled,  did  I  not  know 

that  the  world  Is  moving)  by  the  sheer  inefficiency, 

the  bland,  complacent  failure  of  the  earnest  reader. 

I  am   like  yourself,   the  spectacle   of  Inefficiency 

rouses  my  holy  Ire. 

St 

Before   you    begin    upon    another   masterpiece, 

set  out  In  a  row  the  masterpieces  which  you  are 

proud  of  having  read  during  the  past  year.     Take 

the  first  on  the  list,  that  book  which  you  perused 

in  all  the  zeal  of  your  New  Year  resolutions  for 

systematic  study.     Examine  the  compartments  of 

your  mind.     Search   for  the  ideas   and   emotions 

which     you     have     garnered     from     that     book. 


MENTAL  STOCKTAKING  121 

Think,  and  recollect  when  last  something  from 
that  book  recurred  to  jour  memory  apropos  of 
your  own  daily  commerce  with  humanity.  Is  it 
history — when  did  it  throw  a  light  for  you  on 
modem  politics?  Is  it  science — when  did  it 
show  you  order  in  apparent  disorder,  and  help 
you  to  put  two  and  two  together  into  an  in- 
separable four?  Is  it  ethics — when  did  it 
influence  your  conduct  in  a  twopenny-halfpenny 
affair  between  man  and  man?  Is  it  a  novel — 
when  did  it  help  you  to  "  understand  all  and 
forgive  all "  ?  Is  it  poetry — when  was  it  a 
magnifying  glass  to  disclose  beauty  to  you,  or  a 
fire  to  warm  your  cooling  faith?  If  you  can 
answer  these  questions  satisfactorily,  your  stock- 
taking as  regards  the  fruit  of  your  traffic  with 
that  book  may  be  reckoned  satisfactory.  If  you 
cannot  answer  them  satisfactorily,  then  either  you 
chose  the  book  badly  or  your  impression  that  you 
read  it  is  a  mistaken  one. 

.$( 
When  the  result  of  this  stocktaking  forces  you 
to  the  conclusion  that  your  riches  are  not  so  vast 
as  you  thought  them  to  be,  it  is  necessary  to  look 
about  for  the  causes  of  the  misfortune.  The 
causes  may  be  several.  You  may  have  been  read- 
ing worthless  books.     This,  however,  I  should  say 


122  LITERARY  TASTE 

at  once,  is  extremely  unlikely.  Habitual  and  con- 
firmed readers,  unless  they  happen  to  be  reviewers, 
seldom  read  worthless  books.  In  the  first  place, 
they  are  so  busy  with  books  of  proved  value  that 
they  harve  only  a  small  margin  of  leisure  left  for 
very  modem  works,  and  generally,  before  they  can 
catch  up  with  the  age.  Time  or  the  critic  has 
definitely  threshed  for  them  the  wheat  from  the 
chaff.  No !  Mediocrity  has  not  much  chance  of 
hoodwinking  the  serious  student. 

It  is  less  improbable  that  the  serious  student 
has  been  choosing  his  books  badly.  He  may  do 
this  in  two  ways — absolutely  and  relatively. 
Every  reader  of  long  standing  has  been  through 
the  singular  experience  of  suddenly  seeing  a  book 
with  which  his  eyes  have  been  familiar  for  years. 
He  reads  a  book  with  a  reputation  and  thinks: 
"  Yes,  this  is  a  good  book.  This  book  gives  me 
pleasure."  And  then  after  an  interval,  perhaps 
after  half  a  lifetime,  something  mysterious  happens 
to  his  mental  sight.  He  picks  up  the  book  again, 
and  sees  a  new  and  profound  significance  in  every 
sentence,  and  he  says :  "  I  was  perfectly  blind  to 
this  book  before."  Yet  he  is  no  cleverer  than 
he  used  to  be.  Only  something  has  happened 
to  him.     Let   a   gold  watch   be   discovered  by   a 


MENTAL  STOCKTAKING  123 

supposititious  man  who  has  never  heard  of  watches. 
He  has  a  sense  of  beauty.  He  admires  the  watch, 
and  takes  pleasure  in  it.  He  says :  "  This  is  a 
beautiful  piece  of  bric-a-brac;  I  fully  appreciate 
this  delightful  trinket."  Then  imagine  his  feel- 
ings when  someone  comes  along  with  the  key ; 
imagine  the  light  flooding  his  brain.  Similar  in- 
cidents occur  in  the  eventful  life  of  the  constant 
reader.  He  has  no  key,  and  never  suspects  that 
there  exists  such  a  thing  as  a  key.  That  is  what 
I  call  a  choice  absolutely  bad. 

at 

The  choice  is  relatively  bad  when,  spreading 
over  a  number  of  books,  it  pursues  no  order,  and 
thus  results  in  a  muddle  of  faint  impressions  each 
blurring  the  rest.  Books  must  be  allowed  to 
help  one  another;  they  must  be  skilfully  called 
in  to  each  other's  aid.  And  that  this  may  be 
accomplished  some  guiding  principle  is  necessary, 
"  And  what,"  you  demand,  "  should  that  guiding 
principle  be.^ "  How  do  I  know.?  Nobody, 
fortunately,  can  make  your  principles  for  you. 
You  have  to  make  them  for  yourself.  But  I  will 
venture  upon  this  general  observation:  that  in 
the  mental  world  what  counts  is  not  numbers  but 
co-ordination.  As  regards  facts  and  ideas,  the 
great  mistake  made  by  the  average  well-intentioned 


lU  LITERARY  TASTE 

reader  is  that  he  is  content  with  the  names  of 
things  instead  of  occupying  himself  with  the 
causes  of  things.  He  seeks  answers  to  the 
question  What?  instead  of  to  the  question  Why? 
He  studies  history,  and  never  guesses  that  all 
history  is  caused  by  the  facts  of  geography.  He 
is  a  botanical  expert,  and  can  take  you  to  where 
the  Sibthorpia  europcea  grows,  and  never  troubles 
to  wonder  what  the  earth  would  be  without  its 
cloak  of  plants.  He  wanders  forth  of  starlit 
evenings  and  will  name  you  with  unction  all  the 
constellations  from  Andromeda  to  the  Scorpion; 
but  if  you  ask  him  why  Venus  can  never  be  seen 
at  midnight,  he  will  tell  you  that  he  has  not 
bothered  with  the  scientific  details.  He  has  not 
learned  that  names  are  nothing,  and  the  satisfac- 
tion of  the  lust  of  the  eye  a  trifle  compared  to  the 
imaginative  vision  of  which  scientific  "  details " 
are  the  indispensable  basis. 

Most  reading,  I  am  convinced,  is  unphilo- 
sophical;  that  is  to  say,  it  lacks  the  element 
which  more  than  anything  else  quickens  the 
poetry  of  life.  Unless  and  until  a  man  has  formed 
a  scheme  of  knowledge,  be  it  a  mere  skeleton,  his 
reading  must  necessarily  be  unphilosophical.  He 
must  have  attained  to  some  notion  of  the  inter- 


MENTAL  STOCKTAKING  125 

relations  of  the  various  branches  of  knowledge 
before  he  can  properly  comprehend  the  branch 
in  which  he  specialises.  If  he  has  not  drawn  an 
outline  map  upon  which  he  can  fill  in  whatever 
knowledge  comes  to  him,  as  it  comes,  and  on 
which  he  can  trace  the  affinity  of  every  part  with 
every  other  part,  he  is  assuredly  frittering  away  a 
large  percentage  of  his  efforts.  There  are  certain 
philosophical  works  which,  once  they  are  mastered, 
seem  to  have  performed  an  operation  for  cataract, 
so  that  he  who  was  blind,  having  read  them,  hence- 
forward sees  cause  and  effect  working  in  and  out 
everywhere.  To  use  another  figure,  they  leave 
stamped  on  the  brain  a  chart  of  the  entire  pro- 
vince of  knowledge. 

at 

Such  a  work  is  Spencer's  First  Principles.  I 
know  that  it  is  nearly  useless  to  advise  people  to 
read  First  Principles.  They  are  intimidated  by  the 
sound  of  it ;  and  it  costs  as  much  as  a  dress-circle 
seat  at  the  theatre.  But  if  they  would,  what 
brilliant  stocktakings  there  might  be  in  a  few 
years !  Why,  if  they  would  only  read  such  de- 
tached essays  as  that  on  "  Manners  and  Fashion," 
or  "  The  Genesis  of  Science,"  Spencer's  Essays, 
the  magic  illumination,  the  necessary  power  of 
"  synthetising "  things,   might   be   vouchsafed   to 


126  LITERARY  TASTE 

them.  In  any  case,  the  lack  of  some  such  dis- 
ciplinary, co-ordinating  measure  will  amply  ex- 
plain many  disastrous  stocktakings.  The  manner 
in  which  one  single  ray  of  light,  one  single  pre- 
cious hint,  will  clarify  and  energise  the  whole 
mental  life  of  him  who  receives  it,  is  among  the 
most  wonderful  and  heavenly  of  intellectual 
phenomena.  Some  men  search  for  that  light  and 
never  find  it.     But  most  men  never  search  for  it. 

The  superlative  cause  of  disastrous  stocktakings 
remains,  and  it  is  much  more  simple  than  the  one 
with  which  I  have  just  dealt.  It  consists  in  the 
absence  of  meditation.  People  read,  and  read, 
and  read,  blandly  unconscious  of  their  effrontery 
in  assuming  that  they  can  assimilate  without  any 
further  effort  the  vital  essence  which  the  author 
has  breathed  into  them.  They  cannot.  And  the 
proof  that  they  do  not  is  shown  all  the  time  in 
their  lives.  I  say  that  if  a  man  does  not  spend  at 
least  as  much  time  in  actively  and  definitely 
thinking  about  what  he  has  read  as  he  has  spent 
in  reading,  he  is  simply  insulting  his  author.  If 
he  does  not  submit  himself  to  intellectual  and 
emotional  fatigue  in  classifying  the  communicated 
ideas,  and  in  emphasising  on  his  spirit  the  imprint 
gf    the    communicated    emotions — then     reading 


MENTAE  STOCKTAKING  127 

with  him  is  a  pleasant  pastime  and  nothing  else. 
This  is  a  distressing  fact.  But  it  is  a  fact.  It  is 
distressing,  for  the  reason  that  meditation  is  not 
a  popular  exercise.  If  a  friend  asks  you  what 
you  did  last  night,  you  may  answer,  "  I  was  read- 
ing," and  he  will  be  impressed  and  you  will  be 
proud.  But  if  you  answer,  "  I  was  meditating," 
he  will  have  a  tendency  to  smile  and  you  will 
have  a  tendency  to  blush.  I  know  this.  I  feel 
it  myself.  (I  cannot  offer  any  explanation.) 
But  it  does  not  shake  my  conviction  that  the  ab- 
sence of  meditation  is  the  main  origin  of  disap- 
pointing stocktakings. 


THE  END 


^ 


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